Ok finally getting around to blogging about my trip to Berlin to see Courtney! Sorry about the delay, I had a final and random things to do (and I just wasn’t in the mood lol) and then my family and aunt came! So I was busy showing them around Strasbourg, but that’ll come in the next post (along with our adventure to Italy in the huge 9 seater van we rented).
Anyways, I got into Berlin around 8pm on Tuesday after a tram ride, train ride and plane ride starting around 12:30. I met up with Courtney after some confusion regarding terminals (I was in the mini terminal and she was in the big terminal) but we spotted each other and ran to each other in slow-mo and embraced. Just kidding. But we did find each other and hug and laugh about our mix-up. Then we took a bus to the metro to go to her apartment. Along the way we stopped for durums from a stand called Mustafa’s. Lately I’ve sworn off of durums, doners and gyros because I read online about the health concerns surrounding them, and they made me want to upchuck whenever I thought about it, but I was able to put that aside and scarf down the durum because it looked like real meat and it smelled amazing. Then we went home and chilled.
On Wednesday, we got up because Courtney had class and I was going to chill at the Stanford center and wait for her. So we went there and on the way got apple cakes and coffee (they have coffee to go! Wonderful country already) Oh and I learned the word for apple: apfel! So yeah, we got to the Stanford center, she went to class, I watched gossip girl and glee and the hills and the city and had another cup of coffee, so by the end of Courtney’s class I was jittery and hyper and ready to explore Berlin!
From the center we went to the center of Berlin and saw where the wall used be by the bricks in the ground (running through streets, squares, parks, everything) and some pieces of the wall covered in graffiti art. We were tourists, so we took pictures of everything (well, ok I took pictures of EVERYthing and Court took cool pics lol). Then we saw a random motorcade, but we have no idea what it was for or who was being protected or escorted. Then we walked to the holocaust memorial, which was really interesting. It’s kind of hard to describe or explain, but it was like a block’s worth size area filled with rectangular blocks of different heights. They were arranged in rows and you could walk in between rows or columns (I’m butchering this description – I apologize, see my pics and use your special imagination). Plus, the ground wasn’t even, there were small hills and valleys so at points, the blocks would be 5 feet taller than me, and it was really cool actually. Courtney told me that a lot of German memorials, unlike French ones, are more abstract and open to interpretation, which I think is pretty cool because you can attach your own meaning and significance to things and interpret them differently.
From there we continued on our walk and saw the Handenburg Gate, which is the really old gate going into Berlin (Berlin used to be part of Handenburg, unless I’m mistaken… feel free to correct me if I’m wrong) and the US Embassy was right by there too. Then close by was a big important Berlin building (I don’t actually remember what it was, but it was big and huge and cool looking and said something about the German people on top) and next door was the Prime Minister’s office (would not want to be her right now, seems like everyone in the EU is mad at everyone else). Then I was getting hungry so we decided to run through the bahnhof (train station) to check about going to the airport from there and then get lunch. The bahnhof was huge! It was like 5 floors and basically contained a mall. There were lots of stores and lots of food places, both fast food and real restaurants. We got my ticket and then got on the bahn and went to find a Middle Eastern restaurant where Courtney had eaten with a friend once. It was kind of hard to find again but we found it and got the sample plate thing for 8 euro. It was for 2 people and it’s a good thing we were both starving because it was absolutely HUGE. We got two plates of food, one with 3 types of salad, hummus, fried cheese, falafel and other veggies and the other with potato wedges, meat, and some other stuff and we got pitas and tea! I felt about 200 pounds when we finally left lol, but it was definitely worth the 4 euro each.
After that we went to the East Side Gallery, which is a display of the Berlin wall that’s been covered over with paintings and graffiti (but decorative, not gang related). It’s also in actual spot as the Berlin wall was, they didn’t move it, just painted it and made it into an art display. We took probably 100 pictures there (ok, maybe not but a lot) and I really enjoyed just meandering around the paintings and Courtney would explain some of the poems or phrases on them- lots of things of or relating to freedom, strength, perseverance, etc. some of them were really interesting, some were moving, some were creepy, some were uplifting, there was something of everything. There were some pieces of the wall that were left blank (not sure if it was on purpose or not) but people had taken sharpies or other markers and left their mark on the wall too. Some people left really cool statements (as opposed to something like Mary Smith was here! 2/9/09 or something like that), like one in my pictures I can’t remember exactly what it said but it was along the lines of live life: party hard, laugh often, love freely, don’t give up, conquer life. It was better than that though ☺
Then I was crashing because I didn’t sleep well that night and I needed a nap lol so we headed home and picked up some dinner things on the way (spinach, goat cheese, pears and apples – we wanted something light for dinner after our gigantic lunch). Then I napped and Court did her homework, we ate dinner and got ready to go out. We met up with Courtney’s friend Bianca and went to a cub (I don’t know what the name of it was though). And it was really fun! There were two dance floors, one with more techno/europop and the other with American hip-hop and rap. We would dance for a little bit on one, get bored of it or decide we wanted to escape a guy or something and the go to the other one. We ended up dancing until 430 am, when the bahn starts running again (otherwise we’d have to take a cab home) and in the process, I met a guy from Boulder, CO and Courtney met a few pro basketball players. No big deal haha.
Then we went home and crashed! Court went to class and I just kept sleeping till around 1pm, when I finally got up, showered, had nutella for bfast etc. Then Court got home and we went to Alexanderplatz with the intentions of finishing our cultural tour. We were both still pretty tired from the night before, though, so we got to Alexanderplatz and walked around and it was really cool around there, then we went to the mall to get some food and obviously, getting food turned into going shopping haha. We both got a few things (including coffee from Starbucks, I’ve never appreciated a frappacino to go so much). After that we went home and munched on various things (carrots, apples, cheese, nutella, etc) for dinner since we were full from lunch again. We watched some recent episodes of the Hills and then promptly crashed.
On Thursday, we got up and I went with Courtney to the center again while she had class. We got apple cake and coffee again and I made quick work of her pretzels lol. After her class we again attempted to finish the tour (this time with more success). We got to Alexanderplatz and then went walking and got some food and coffee at Dunkin Donuts (so euro, I know haha, but it was sooo good, my first bagel in 5 months) and walked to a fountain to eat and chat. We saw the communist TV tower and a pretty church, walked through the tourist area, got called beautiful and sexy by creepy men selling souvenirs (wonder if I could’ve gotten a discount…) and walked to the book burning square. Oh and a guy tried to court me with a leaf (I mean, come on, I’m worth at least a flower lol). We took pics by the communist statues and the river and the book burning square and the churches and the chocolate store. The story of the churches was pretty cool – there’s a Protestant and a Catholic church in the same square (also by an opera house) facing each other and the Protestants built the Catholic church and vice versa (apparently as a show of peaceful coexistence). The chocolate store was amazing also – they had like 4 counters full of truffles! I got two little ones: one with almond crème and one that was Irish coffee and they were both soooo good! I honestly don’t remember what we did that night for dinner, but we didn’t go out.
Friday was my last day in Berlin and we just kind of chilled for most of it, ran some errands and did a little more shopping before going home and getting ready to go out again. We met up with Courtney’s friends who were going to a concert (Bootie in Berlin- it would’ve been awesome to go because I love the type of music they do – it’s all mashups and remixes- but I had an 8 am flight the next day and the concert didn’t start till 12 and my friends in Stras and I had plans for our “last night” in Strasbourg because people we leaving and we wanted one last night of going out together so we decided to meet them for drinks before but not go to the concert). So we were in East Berlin and the feel was so cool because it was so different from West Berlin. Honestly, if I knew German better (read: at all) I think I’d like Germany better than France. Not that I didn’t fall in love with aspects of the French culture, people and place, but Germany is both familiar and foreign I think. It’s much more like the US in the attitude about working and the people look more American to me (probably because Germans were one of the main groups of immigrants in the US and the French weren’t).
anyways, Saturday I left and was back in France and then soon I'll have to blog about my family coming to Strasbourg and our trip to Italia! bises!
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Thursday, May 27, 2010
surreal
This whole experience has been so surreal. At various times throughout my semester abroad, I've found myself looking around and thinking to myself, "Who am I? This is not real life. This is not real." But it was, and it is, and it's almost all the past tense, was. That is freaking me out right now.
Last night I had a great night out with my friends. Some of us went to dinner to an Alsatian restaurant my friend Anna loves (she set up the dinner as a last-night-dinner-going-away type thing) and then we went out together afterwards. The dinner was amazing and so much fun and the food was amazing (the french just have a way with their ducks... I haven't had a bad duck in France lol) but the setting was bittersweet. Most of us were in the midst of exams, but some were done, some were leaving and some had already left. Anyways, after dinner, we ended up meeting at Rafiot, a boat club. It was alright, but it was so packed it was hard to move and was more like being in a mosh pit than a dance club. So we didn't stay very long. I left with Anna to walk her home and hang out for a little bit while she packed the rest of her things to leave this morning (she left at 8 this morning). We talked about our experiences and how we've changed and how we're both excited but also nervous to go home. Because we've changed. Our friends have changed. Our families have probably changed. Things won't be exactly the same when we get home, but we're not sure how they'll be different. But even more than that, last night it hit me that I've made friends here, friends that don't go to BC, friends that I may never see again. And while Anna goes to school at Princeton, which isn't far from Boston and totally do-able by car or train, she and I may never be in the same city again. We want to visit each other at school and it would be so fun to see each other's lives in the US, but last night was when it started sinking in that I'm leaving this place and when I come back, my experience will be completely different. I won't be a student (probably) and most of the people I've met here probably won't be here (with exceptions of course). All these conflicting thoughts also make it harder to study, which is a major problem because I have my last and most terrifying exam on Saturday.
Oh well. As they say, "you don't remember the tests you took, but you do remember the nights you didn't study." And I only have a few of those nights left... I guess I'm also a little curious to see if others notice that I've changed. Because I know I have, but I'm not sure if those inward changes will manifest themselves outwardly. I think I kind of hope so. Because I like how I've changed, I think I've grown in a good way. I've learned to take chances, have confidence, read a map, get myself home at 3 am, interact with people I don't understand, downplay my "american-ness," like beer, pick a good wine, survive in foreign countries, eat mushrooms and onions and try to eat ground meat (didn't take).
In conclusion, I am definitely making it back to Strasbourg and Europe, I've left too many place unexplored and there's too many things on my European to-do list that are still undone. Some might have to wait till I make my millions, but they will happen one day and I feel so grateful that I was able to have this experience. It wasn't real life, it was a storybook life, with all the ups and downs in a story (but a little lack of climax... unless you count my adventures as many mini climaxes) and all the necessary characters and settings: castles, princesses, best friends, great food, memories to last a lifetime (maybe longer) and all those philosophical things like growth, self-realization, etc. I guess there was a lack of a white knight slaying a dragon and rescuing me, but hey, who needs boys, right? I'll save myself and ride off into the sunset on my own white horse (or easyjet airplane) ;)
bises, love to all~
ps. I will eventually post Berlin update, I have it written down, I just haven't been in the mood lately.
Saturday, May 22, 2010
update
back in strasbourg after visiting Courtney in Berlin!
Coming attractions:
1. update on Berlin
2. pics from Berlin
Things that have to happen first:
1. nap
2. laundry
3. handwash laundry
Other things going on:
1. LAST final next sat
2. Family comes next sat!
3. Joanie comes next Sunday!
4. leaving for Switzerland and Italy next Monday
5. returning to the US in 22 days!!
alright, will post more after i sleep and get some coffee or something...
Coming attractions:
1. update on Berlin
2. pics from Berlin
Things that have to happen first:
1. nap
2. laundry
3. handwash laundry
Other things going on:
1. LAST final next sat
2. Family comes next sat!
3. Joanie comes next Sunday!
4. leaving for Switzerland and Italy next Monday
5. returning to the US in 22 days!!
alright, will post more after i sleep and get some coffee or something...
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Bitte, Danke, das ist gut: learning German!
Well, its been awhile, sorry about that, I had an exam on Wednesday and I've had a headache basically since then. But now its getting better :) so, I figured I should take advantage of my procrastination and do something useful: BLOG! haha so I went to Heidelberg with my friend Anna from Princeton on Saturday and it was awesome! We started the day nice and early (at 6:30 - UGH) so we could catch a cab at 7:20 to get to Kehl (just over the border in Germany) for our 8:04 train ride to Offenburg, where we switch, take a train to Karlsruhe, switch again and then go to Heidelberg. It wasn't bad tho, the connections were easy, all the trains were on time so it wasn't hard or stressful.
So, yeah, we got to Heidelberg and went to the tourism office for free maps and help. They told us to take the tram to Bismarkplatz and then walk along Hauptstraße, which is the main walking street in Heidelberg with lots of shops and restaurants and cafés and stuff like that. It was really cute. We meandered around there and then stopped for a cup of coffee and a pastry at a café. We ran into the Ritter house, the oldest house in Budapest and the heiliggeistkirche, the church (= kirche) while wandering. Then we headed to the castle (schloss in German), up a really steep path to a castle that's partially in ruins and partially still put together. It was really cool and had great views of Heidelberg. The gardens were also really cool because you could wander around and poke around the ruins.
After that we went to the student prison and the Heidelberg university museum. The student prison was really funny because it was like 5 rooms and it was used from the 1700s until 1914 because the students were outside legal jurisdiction, so there was a university prison keeper person who distributed justice to students for crimes like pig chasing, drunken debauchery and causing ruckus in the streets. It was also a right of passage for the students to get put in prison, if they didn't get arrested at least once at school, they were known as losers lol. The other cool part was that the whole inside of the prison was graffiti-ed, with lots of self-portraits from the students and the dates they were there, and of course various other drawings. The museum of the Heidelberg university was in the same building so we went through that, but it was less interesting (especially since it was all in German and I speak approximated 12 words of German), so we just sped through it.
From there we went on a search for weinerschnitzel and eventually found it at a place where Anna could get jagerschnitzel. So we both got our schnitzels and spaetzle - I love spaetzle lol its a type of egg noodle, but it doesn't really look like a noodle... it looks kind of like... well, this: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUfZRHfIp2dl1kEhWr4zQ8ajWE34rG-Lk3OfKae2kM085qed_13x64plyMff9zg44WWudukrkiyWo_98Xy6mmKdZN849WQGp7K1t9qyASKbFBKAr38ytW-Pt7DsUqICf49RTJPN7Qxrkiz/s400/spaetzle.jpg lunch was delicious, I'm a fan of weinerschnitzel lol. We finished our lunch and then from there we decided to go explore philosopher's way, which is a path on the other side of the river that's supposed to have great views.
So we paid, left the restaurant and headed towards the bridge. We crossed the bridge and then had to climb this really windy path up to the philosopher's path. It did have really nice views though! And then we decided to look for these ruins I read about in my book. We found the first of them, after hiking (legit hiking while I was in converse and jeans and Anna was in leggings and boots without traction lol) for like 2 hours. We found the ruins of an 11th century benedictine monastery. The watchtower was still in really good shape, I'm not sure if it had been redone or not, but we could get in it and climb to the top! so we took lots of pics there :) and the monastery was cool too, but it was definitely "ruins" all the walls had caved in and there was only one doorway left, but you could still tell what was what, we could see the alter, so we could make out the church. There were other rooms that I'm assuming were where the monks lived and cooked and studied. It was really cool. We wanted to keep going and find the 9th century basilica and the thing the Nazis built, but it was getting later and we didn't want to get stuck on the mountain at night. So, we decided to just head down and get celebratory beers.
We got down, and found a café where we got our beers and they were good, although I expected Germany to have good beer :) but it did really impress me on the gastronomy front. Anyways, it started getting chilly and we were getting a little short on time, so we went to go find a place for dinner. Anna wanted to get a certain dessert, I forget what its called, but its like a pancake cut up with powdered sugar, cinnamon and applesauce. We found a place that had it, so she got that and a salad for dinner and I got goulash and a salad. It was exactly what I wanted too, lately I've been craving soup and salad combos (probably because they don't do that here haha and I miss both soup and salad, so when they come together its heaven!)
So yeah, we had dinner, and then decided to walk back to Bismarkplatz to get the tram to go to the train station for our 9:45 train. We had a few connections again, Heidelberg --> Mannheim --> Offenburg --> Strasbourg. We ended up getting to Stras around 12 and took a cab home. Oh home sweet home after a day of exploring :) But a GREAT day of exploring! Heidelberg: check! :D
Now, off to see Courtney in Berlin for a few days! Maybe I'll learn a few more German words!
Gutentag! <3
PS. Calendar check: leaving today for Berlin, getting back Saturday. A week of "studying," my las econ final and my family comes (!!!) next sat (5/29), Joanie comes the next day (5/30), a week and a half of traveling in Switzerland and Italy, then HOME on 6/13. CANNOT BELIEVE IT. It's gone so fast and its almost over! And I'm SO excited to see my family and SO excited to get home, but I
So, yeah, we got to Heidelberg and went to the tourism office for free maps and help. They told us to take the tram to Bismarkplatz and then walk along Hauptstraße, which is the main walking street in Heidelberg with lots of shops and restaurants and cafés and stuff like that. It was really cute. We meandered around there and then stopped for a cup of coffee and a pastry at a café. We ran into the Ritter house, the oldest house in Budapest and the heiliggeistkirche, the church (= kirche) while wandering. Then we headed to the castle (schloss in German), up a really steep path to a castle that's partially in ruins and partially still put together. It was really cool and had great views of Heidelberg. The gardens were also really cool because you could wander around and poke around the ruins.
After that we went to the student prison and the Heidelberg university museum. The student prison was really funny because it was like 5 rooms and it was used from the 1700s until 1914 because the students were outside legal jurisdiction, so there was a university prison keeper person who distributed justice to students for crimes like pig chasing, drunken debauchery and causing ruckus in the streets. It was also a right of passage for the students to get put in prison, if they didn't get arrested at least once at school, they were known as losers lol. The other cool part was that the whole inside of the prison was graffiti-ed, with lots of self-portraits from the students and the dates they were there, and of course various other drawings. The museum of the Heidelberg university was in the same building so we went through that, but it was less interesting (especially since it was all in German and I speak approximated 12 words of German), so we just sped through it.
From there we went on a search for weinerschnitzel and eventually found it at a place where Anna could get jagerschnitzel. So we both got our schnitzels and spaetzle - I love spaetzle lol its a type of egg noodle, but it doesn't really look like a noodle... it looks kind of like... well, this: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUfZRHfIp2dl1kEhWr4zQ8ajWE34rG-Lk3OfKae2kM085qed_13x64plyMff9zg44WWudukrkiyWo_98Xy6mmKdZN849WQGp7K1t9qyASKbFBKAr38ytW-Pt7DsUqICf49RTJPN7Qxrkiz/s400/spaetzle.jpg lunch was delicious, I'm a fan of weinerschnitzel lol. We finished our lunch and then from there we decided to go explore philosopher's way, which is a path on the other side of the river that's supposed to have great views.
So we paid, left the restaurant and headed towards the bridge. We crossed the bridge and then had to climb this really windy path up to the philosopher's path. It did have really nice views though! And then we decided to look for these ruins I read about in my book. We found the first of them, after hiking (legit hiking while I was in converse and jeans and Anna was in leggings and boots without traction lol) for like 2 hours. We found the ruins of an 11th century benedictine monastery. The watchtower was still in really good shape, I'm not sure if it had been redone or not, but we could get in it and climb to the top! so we took lots of pics there :) and the monastery was cool too, but it was definitely "ruins" all the walls had caved in and there was only one doorway left, but you could still tell what was what, we could see the alter, so we could make out the church. There were other rooms that I'm assuming were where the monks lived and cooked and studied. It was really cool. We wanted to keep going and find the 9th century basilica and the thing the Nazis built, but it was getting later and we didn't want to get stuck on the mountain at night. So, we decided to just head down and get celebratory beers.
We got down, and found a café where we got our beers and they were good, although I expected Germany to have good beer :) but it did really impress me on the gastronomy front. Anyways, it started getting chilly and we were getting a little short on time, so we went to go find a place for dinner. Anna wanted to get a certain dessert, I forget what its called, but its like a pancake cut up with powdered sugar, cinnamon and applesauce. We found a place that had it, so she got that and a salad for dinner and I got goulash and a salad. It was exactly what I wanted too, lately I've been craving soup and salad combos (probably because they don't do that here haha and I miss both soup and salad, so when they come together its heaven!)
So yeah, we had dinner, and then decided to walk back to Bismarkplatz to get the tram to go to the train station for our 9:45 train. We had a few connections again, Heidelberg --> Mannheim --> Offenburg --> Strasbourg. We ended up getting to Stras around 12 and took a cab home. Oh home sweet home after a day of exploring :) But a GREAT day of exploring! Heidelberg: check! :D
Now, off to see Courtney in Berlin for a few days! Maybe I'll learn a few more German words!
Gutentag! <3
PS. Calendar check: leaving today for Berlin, getting back Saturday. A week of "studying," my las econ final and my family comes (!!!) next sat (5/29), Joanie comes the next day (5/30), a week and a half of traveling in Switzerland and Italy, then HOME on 6/13. CANNOT BELIEVE IT. It's gone so fast and its almost over! And I'm SO excited to see my family and SO excited to get home, but I
Sunday, May 16, 2010
Ma Famille!
This is my french family - sorry it took me 5 months to get a pic (I'm awkward asking for pictures, and they asked for a pic with me so it was really easy) Anyways, from left to right: Jean-Michel, Raphaël, Marie-Claude, Nicolas, me!
ps. Heidelberg pics and update coming... hopefully soon... and then BERLIN WITH COURTNEY!!! :)
Friday, May 7, 2010
Printemps
Pics from Strasbourg in the springtime are up on both facebook and photobucket :) enjoy!
Also, I'm going to Heidelberg tomorrow! Update to follow (obvi)
*bises~
Also, I'm going to Heidelberg tomorrow! Update to follow (obvi)
*bises~
Saturday, May 1, 2010
lists.
I love lists.
Reasons I love lists:
- everything can have its own list
- it helps keep me organized
- I love checking things off my lists (yep, got those groceries, finished that hw, went for a run, etc.)
- there is something so calming about making lists
- I love compartmentalizing everything (probably has to do with the organization thing)
- its one of my "things" - I'm known for my OCD lists (thanks, Mom, got it from you), and so its a fixture in my life (and since I'm a creature of habit, I like fixtures in my life)
[reasons I love] Strasbourg in the spring:
- all the flowers bloomed at the same time, so the city was a riot of color all at once
- now the flowers are falling, but they haven't all fallen yet, so there's green mixed with the colors
- I don't have to wear my down parka anymore
- I even went out in a dress without a coat!
- I'm so close to the end here and I'm realizing and appreciating the things I'm going to miss
+ the pace, as inconvenient as it is that things close from 12-2 every day, its kind of nice that people take time off of work to eat, talk, come home, relax, etc.
+ fresh french bread. 'nuff said.
+ wine being cheaper than water
+ my host family
+ the clubs and how guys actually dance here (although dancing like a french person is difficult and not that fun)
+ the cheese
+ riding my bike
+ speaking French everywhere (almost)
+ TRAVELING
+ drinking age: 18
- Then again, there are things that I really won't miss:
+ people looking at me and knowing that I'm American
+ the stereotypes associated with American girls
+ the inefficiency with everything
- And then there are the things that I just can't get here that I am so excited for when I get home:
+ baby carrots
+ japanese rice
+ spicy salsa
+ my car
+ gyms
+ the mountains
+ the radio
+ TV in English
+ everyone speaking my language
+ my blackberry
+ Walmart
+ seeing my family and friends!
+ whole grain bread
+ Herbal Essences
- And then, there are the things I've learned or how I've changed:
+ I can more objectively view each culture (I think)
+ I can appreciate aspects of each culture and I think I'm getting at comparing them without saying one is better than the other, they're just different
+ my French has gotten a lot better
+ I'm much more confident in foreign places
+ I don't mind doing my own thing
+ I can also adapt to go with the flow of what others want (I hope)
+ I'm more aware of a lot of things (like cultural differences, people around me and how they act towards me, etc)
+ With every new place I live in, aka Boston and France, I realize that I could live there (France would take a lot more getting used to), but home to me is Colorado. I could come to love a lot of places, but the place I feel most myself and most at home always seems to be Colorado, and it took leaving to realize that. Not that I regret leaving for school or for France at all, I'm glad I did, because I think I've learned a lot about myself the past few months, and tons over the past three years. That's a whole other list that I do not need nor want to get into.
Groceries I need to buy:
- apples
- crackers
- dark chocolate
- carrots
just looked at my calendar. My family comes in 4 weeks from yesterday, I leave for the US in 6 weeks from today, I'll be a senior in 4 months, and it's May. When did April end? Where has the past 4 months gone?
ps. pics from springtime here will go up soon :)
Reasons I love lists:
- everything can have its own list
- it helps keep me organized
- I love checking things off my lists (yep, got those groceries, finished that hw, went for a run, etc.)
- there is something so calming about making lists
- I love compartmentalizing everything (probably has to do with the organization thing)
- its one of my "things" - I'm known for my OCD lists (thanks, Mom, got it from you), and so its a fixture in my life (and since I'm a creature of habit, I like fixtures in my life)
[reasons I love] Strasbourg in the spring:
- all the flowers bloomed at the same time, so the city was a riot of color all at once
- now the flowers are falling, but they haven't all fallen yet, so there's green mixed with the colors
- I don't have to wear my down parka anymore
- I even went out in a dress without a coat!
- I'm so close to the end here and I'm realizing and appreciating the things I'm going to miss
+ the pace, as inconvenient as it is that things close from 12-2 every day, its kind of nice that people take time off of work to eat, talk, come home, relax, etc.
+ fresh french bread. 'nuff said.
+ wine being cheaper than water
+ my host family
+ the clubs and how guys actually dance here (although dancing like a french person is difficult and not that fun)
+ the cheese
+ riding my bike
+ speaking French everywhere (almost)
+ TRAVELING
+ drinking age: 18
- Then again, there are things that I really won't miss:
+ people looking at me and knowing that I'm American
+ the stereotypes associated with American girls
+ the inefficiency with everything
- And then there are the things that I just can't get here that I am so excited for when I get home:
+ baby carrots
+ japanese rice
+ spicy salsa
+ my car
+ gyms
+ the mountains
+ the radio
+ TV in English
+ everyone speaking my language
+ my blackberry
+ Walmart
+ seeing my family and friends!
+ whole grain bread
+ Herbal Essences
- And then, there are the things I've learned or how I've changed:
+ I can more objectively view each culture (I think)
+ I can appreciate aspects of each culture and I think I'm getting at comparing them without saying one is better than the other, they're just different
+ my French has gotten a lot better
+ I'm much more confident in foreign places
+ I don't mind doing my own thing
+ I can also adapt to go with the flow of what others want (I hope)
+ I'm more aware of a lot of things (like cultural differences, people around me and how they act towards me, etc)
+ With every new place I live in, aka Boston and France, I realize that I could live there (France would take a lot more getting used to), but home to me is Colorado. I could come to love a lot of places, but the place I feel most myself and most at home always seems to be Colorado, and it took leaving to realize that. Not that I regret leaving for school or for France at all, I'm glad I did, because I think I've learned a lot about myself the past few months, and tons over the past three years. That's a whole other list that I do not need nor want to get into.
Groceries I need to buy:
- apples
- crackers
- dark chocolate
- carrots
just looked at my calendar. My family comes in 4 weeks from yesterday, I leave for the US in 6 weeks from today, I'll be a senior in 4 months, and it's May. When did April end? Where has the past 4 months gone?
ps. pics from springtime here will go up soon :)
Monday, April 26, 2010
It's GRΣΣK to me!
Last day of vaca! Sunday 4/11
Erin and I decided the night before that we would sleep till 9 or 930ish and then get up and peace out of the hotel. Except that something woke us both up at 7:30 and I mumbled "we have another hour and a half" but I had my retainer in, so E heard "I wish we had another hour and a half" so I went back to sleep, to look up 20 minutes later to a showered and dress Erin telling me to wake up. Lol good start to the morning. So I looked at her, looked at the time and then went back to sleep. She looked at the time, got back in pjs and went back to bed. We both got up an hour later at the right time haha. Then we both dressed quickly and packed up to check out. We went by the bfast room and snagged some food the last 10 minutes it was open. I think we actually stole bfast because I'm not sure it was included in our room, but oh well, the hostel wasn't worth 20euro each, so we got our money's worth with the bfast :)
So we checked out, left our bags there and headed to the museum we tried to go to yesterday, the Archeological museum. It was pretty cool, it chronicled the different peoples who had lived in Greece and specifically the Thess area from prehistory until present day. It was a little bit wasted on us, though, because we were absolutely exhausted from the night train, not really sleeping the day before and just being busy for the previous 10 days. Thus, we decided we needed an iced coffee. Greeks love their iced coffees apparently, and I love them for loving that, because I haven't found iced coffee ANYwhere else! So we got our coffees and people watched a bit. I guess I could describe the Greeks at this point: guidos. They seemed straight out of Jersey Shore, the MTV series. I mean, all the guys had greasy, slicked back hair, orange fake tans, too-tight shirts and big beefy upper bodies supported by scrawny legs (my favorite was when I saw one of those guys walking a teeny tiny little dog on a teeny tiny little leash haha). The women were all wearing jeans that were too tight, high heels and too much make up, often times with fake blonde hair. It was not what we were expecting from Greece (although, to be fair, we were expecting paradise, aka the islands, and we were in Northern Greece which might be more industrial).
After our coffees, we wandered around a little more, just kind of wandering on streets that we hadn't wandered before (most of them) we decided to grab a late lunch and so we started looking for restaurants. Most places were only serving coffee at this time, but we found a really neat little place tucked into a side street. It was all in Greek and the waitress barely spoke English, but she was really nice so we decided to sit and eat there. All over the inside were pages of the Shell Silverstein story the Giving Tree, which was another reason we decided to stay - it was just a neat little place! And it seemed much more authentic than the places along the boardwalk. We got the "salad with vegetables" and "chicken, it is delicious" not knowing what either came with, how it was cooked, or anything. The salad was amazing, though, it was just a lettuce salad with cucumbers, tomatoes and feta cheese, balsamic and olive oil, but it was really good! The waitress laughed at us at how quickly we finished and assured us that the chicken will be "perfect" Which it was, it was hunks of white meat chicken and bell peppers marinated in something and then grilled. We finished that just as quickly, sopping up all the sauce with the bread she brought us. And then when the check came, that was the best part - the bread was free (a first) and the total for our meal was only 11euro!! that's less than we each had to pay for every other meal! So, for anyone going to Thess soon, go find this place! (not that I could tell you where it was... lol)
After that delish meal, we wandered slowly back to the hotel and Erin got some ice cream along the way lol. At this point we were majorly struggling and I was getting cranky (sorry, E) because we were both just exhausted. We got our things from the hotel and went to the train station to meet the girl I'd be staying with that night, Laura. She's from Germany, studied in France and is now teaching in Thess, and she was great, she was a really nice host and even made me dinner! Oh, Erin found her on a network website called couchsurfers.com, where people volunteer to host travelers for free to save money on traveling! It's a really cool thing. So Erin went and got on her train and I went home with Laura. She said she was really tired and I was too, so we just watched Sex and the City for a few hours and then went to bed.
I got up a few hours later (at like 5 ugh) to catch my cab to go to the airport. My cab driver was hilarious, if you've seen My Big Fat Greek Wedding, he was just like the dad. He kept telling me how all english words come from greek words, don't worry, he's writing a book about it haha. For example: "mother comes from "mum" which is the sound a baby makes when it wants food, so "mother" comes from "mum" which means food. and disaster comes from the word for "difficulty" and "stars" (astro), life/live comes from via, etc etc. I don't remember most of the examples he gave but those were a few, and they were just funny lol
So I got to the airport safe and sound thanks to my lovely cab driver, got on the plane, landed in Stuttgart, got my bag, found the metro, took that to the train station, waited around for my train and then took that to Strasbourg, where I got in around 2:00. Then I came home and crashed for about the next week (in between writing and editing my 19 page history paper, of course! haha)
And so, that is the end of my Grand Adventure. I'll blog more about my recent rediscovery of Strasbourg in the springtime (its absolutely beautiful) and then coming up, I have trips lined up for Colmar (just a day trip), Berlin (to see Courtney!!!!) and hopefully Heidelburg, the castle and maybe Nancy.
Only a month left until my family comes, but I plan to make the most of it! so stay tuned haha :) love love~
Erin and I decided the night before that we would sleep till 9 or 930ish and then get up and peace out of the hotel. Except that something woke us both up at 7:30 and I mumbled "we have another hour and a half" but I had my retainer in, so E heard "I wish we had another hour and a half" so I went back to sleep, to look up 20 minutes later to a showered and dress Erin telling me to wake up. Lol good start to the morning. So I looked at her, looked at the time and then went back to sleep. She looked at the time, got back in pjs and went back to bed. We both got up an hour later at the right time haha. Then we both dressed quickly and packed up to check out. We went by the bfast room and snagged some food the last 10 minutes it was open. I think we actually stole bfast because I'm not sure it was included in our room, but oh well, the hostel wasn't worth 20euro each, so we got our money's worth with the bfast :)
So we checked out, left our bags there and headed to the museum we tried to go to yesterday, the Archeological museum. It was pretty cool, it chronicled the different peoples who had lived in Greece and specifically the Thess area from prehistory until present day. It was a little bit wasted on us, though, because we were absolutely exhausted from the night train, not really sleeping the day before and just being busy for the previous 10 days. Thus, we decided we needed an iced coffee. Greeks love their iced coffees apparently, and I love them for loving that, because I haven't found iced coffee ANYwhere else! So we got our coffees and people watched a bit. I guess I could describe the Greeks at this point: guidos. They seemed straight out of Jersey Shore, the MTV series. I mean, all the guys had greasy, slicked back hair, orange fake tans, too-tight shirts and big beefy upper bodies supported by scrawny legs (my favorite was when I saw one of those guys walking a teeny tiny little dog on a teeny tiny little leash haha). The women were all wearing jeans that were too tight, high heels and too much make up, often times with fake blonde hair. It was not what we were expecting from Greece (although, to be fair, we were expecting paradise, aka the islands, and we were in Northern Greece which might be more industrial).
After our coffees, we wandered around a little more, just kind of wandering on streets that we hadn't wandered before (most of them) we decided to grab a late lunch and so we started looking for restaurants. Most places were only serving coffee at this time, but we found a really neat little place tucked into a side street. It was all in Greek and the waitress barely spoke English, but she was really nice so we decided to sit and eat there. All over the inside were pages of the Shell Silverstein story the Giving Tree, which was another reason we decided to stay - it was just a neat little place! And it seemed much more authentic than the places along the boardwalk. We got the "salad with vegetables" and "chicken, it is delicious" not knowing what either came with, how it was cooked, or anything. The salad was amazing, though, it was just a lettuce salad with cucumbers, tomatoes and feta cheese, balsamic and olive oil, but it was really good! The waitress laughed at us at how quickly we finished and assured us that the chicken will be "perfect" Which it was, it was hunks of white meat chicken and bell peppers marinated in something and then grilled. We finished that just as quickly, sopping up all the sauce with the bread she brought us. And then when the check came, that was the best part - the bread was free (a first) and the total for our meal was only 11euro!! that's less than we each had to pay for every other meal! So, for anyone going to Thess soon, go find this place! (not that I could tell you where it was... lol)
After that delish meal, we wandered slowly back to the hotel and Erin got some ice cream along the way lol. At this point we were majorly struggling and I was getting cranky (sorry, E) because we were both just exhausted. We got our things from the hotel and went to the train station to meet the girl I'd be staying with that night, Laura. She's from Germany, studied in France and is now teaching in Thess, and she was great, she was a really nice host and even made me dinner! Oh, Erin found her on a network website called couchsurfers.com, where people volunteer to host travelers for free to save money on traveling! It's a really cool thing. So Erin went and got on her train and I went home with Laura. She said she was really tired and I was too, so we just watched Sex and the City for a few hours and then went to bed.
I got up a few hours later (at like 5 ugh) to catch my cab to go to the airport. My cab driver was hilarious, if you've seen My Big Fat Greek Wedding, he was just like the dad. He kept telling me how all english words come from greek words, don't worry, he's writing a book about it haha. For example: "mother comes from "mum" which is the sound a baby makes when it wants food, so "mother" comes from "mum" which means food. and disaster comes from the word for "difficulty" and "stars" (astro), life/live comes from via, etc etc. I don't remember most of the examples he gave but those were a few, and they were just funny lol
So I got to the airport safe and sound thanks to my lovely cab driver, got on the plane, landed in Stuttgart, got my bag, found the metro, took that to the train station, waited around for my train and then took that to Strasbourg, where I got in around 2:00. Then I came home and crashed for about the next week (in between writing and editing my 19 page history paper, of course! haha)
And so, that is the end of my Grand Adventure. I'll blog more about my recent rediscovery of Strasbourg in the springtime (its absolutely beautiful) and then coming up, I have trips lined up for Colmar (just a day trip), Berlin (to see Courtney!!!!) and hopefully Heidelburg, the castle and maybe Nancy.
Only a month left until my family comes, but I plan to make the most of it! so stay tuned haha :) love love~
Friday, April 23, 2010
rocked by rakı
Ok so I fail at updating consistently. Sorry! But I do have a good excuse - Dani came to visit! Dani is a BC student studying in Paris right now and due to the volcano, her spring break plans got severely changed... as in a week of them got canceled :( so she came here for a few days instead! It was so great having someone come visit and the timing couldn't have been more perfect - I finished my paper last week, finished my exam Wed morning and she came Wed night. The weather was amazing - sun and warmth without any rain - and the length was just right too - wed night to friday afternoon. We saw basically all of downtown Stras on Thursday, went up to the top of the cathedral, had a picnic lunch of bread, cheese and wine along the river, saw my school, and then came home and napped/read in my little yard. Then today we saw the European Institutions, walked through l'Orangerie (the park) and stumbled onto the zoo :) basically, she was my guinea pig for when my family comes! and it went really well! It was also so fun to have someone to show off "my" city to.
anyways, back to my trip to Istanbul.
Tuesday 4/6
We woke up late again and Erin had class so Caitlin and I had instructions to amuse ourselves with the Palaces: Dolma Baçhe and Topkapı. We went to the Dolma Baçhe, which we found out was the president's house and where Atatürk died, and Caitlin promptly made friends with a turkish guy around our age (I think) while waiting in line for tickets. He found out we were studying France and that we speak french and brought his cousin over. His cousin was actually pretty cool - he was a little bit older (around 30) and actually wasn't interested in us, it was so nice lol. He and I talked while Caitlin tried to avoid giving out any personal information to her new Turkish boyfriend. The cousin turned out to live in Metz, which is about am hour north-west of Strasbourg, so it was really fun talking to him. We got into the Palace (using a very sneaky ID handoff for a 9 YTL discount!) and evaded our new bfs, took a guided tour through the palace and then wandered around the grounds a bit. The Palace was really cool, with lots of beautiful paintings by mostly Italian painters, but it felt like we breezed through it and didnt really get to see a lot of them. Although, I guess the tour was supposed to be about the palace and not the paintings... but oh well.
After that we walked to Taksim, which is the main shopping/bar/restaurant area in Istanbul and we walked the main street there because Caitlin wanted to find Top Shop and I wanted to shop. Neither of us ended up getting anything but the street was cool anyways. From there we walked to a bus stop, got on a bus to go back to Erin's. We also stopped along the way and got breakfast supplies (since we just about killed her yogurt and cereal) and hummus. Oh my gosh the hummus was sooo good. I haven't had any since December I think, but it was amazing. We got home and obviously dug into the hummus with bread and veggies. Then we decided we wanted a more substantial meal, so we ordered in and got 2 chicken dishes and 2 salads for the 3 of us. It also came with bread and the chicken was delightfully spicy :) then it was time to get ready to go out! So we were all getting ready and Erin and her roommates "graciously" gave us the last of their rakı, which is the turkish liquor. It's mixed with water and it turns from a clear liquor into a milky white drink that tastes like black licorice with the burn of liquor. Delicious, let me tell you... (feel the sarcasm). So we had that before heading out. We went out in Taksim, stopping at a bar for some cheap drinks, then going somewhere else for better, more expensive drinks, and then finally going to Ritim Roof for some dancing.
The next day, Wednesday, we got up late again and Caitlin and I decided to go to a Turkish Bathhouse for a traditional turkish bath. What an experience. We went to Cagaloglu, the 300 year old historical hamam and got kind of ripped off (somehow the prices doubled from what we saw somewhere else... oh well), but we paid and got shown to our changing room. From there two LARGE turkish women took us to the hot room, where there were little alcoves all around with faucets of hot and cold water and basins. Oh, and LOTS of naked women. Like I said, experience. We're not used to that. But anyways, we sat by one of the faucets and basins and basically splashed ourselves for awhile, all the while getting more and more dehydrated. Eventually the LTW (Large Turkish Women) came back in and took us to the middle of the room, where there was a big marble slab. We laid down and they scrubbed all the dead skin off of us, then soaped us up and gave us a massage. It was kind of funny to be rolling around on the marble slab while these LTW soaped and suds us up lol, then took us to an alcove and rinsed us off, washed our hair and gave us "face massages" I'm not actually sure what my face massage was, but I think it was her wiping water off my face. Anyways, after that the LTW wrapped us in fluffy towels and took us back to our changing room. They gave us each a free gift of soap, a comb and Q-tips, and then sat outside the room while we changed. When we left, they were still sitting there and we thought they might've been waiting for a tip, but I honestly had no more money left and even if i did, I'm not sure the bath was worth the price, let alone an extra tip. But oh well, they were nice and we said thank you and left.
After that we walked to the Hagia Sofia, where we would've had to pay 20 YTL for a 30 min tour of the museum. No thanks. So instead, we went to a hotel cafe and got a snack :) Although, I'm pretty sure the hotel was probably a front operation for the turkish mafia. While we were there, a bunch of older turkish men in black suits walked into the hotel, said something the manager and walked down the stairs through a partially hidden door. Mafia, I'm telling you. lol
So after the once-in-a-lifetime (literally, never paying that much to be scrubbed and soaped by LTW ever again) and our snack in the Mafia hotel, Cait and I went to meet Erin and Beria at Kabataş and got on the ferry to go to Asia! So we cross the Bosphorus river, got coffee and baklava in a cafe, and then went back, but I have now officially been to 3 continents! Only have to get 4 more... lol
From there we went to a really neat part of Istanbul called Ortaköy. It's along the river and is a LOT less touristy than most of the places we'd seen. They had some street vendors selling jewelry and scarves, but nothing on the scale of the Grand Bazaar and it was just a lot calmer than the rest of the city. I really enjoyed it, it was probably my favorite part of Istanbul that I saw. We got dinner in a restaurant there too, I tried the mantı, which was good, but it was like ravioli and it had ground beef :( so I ended up disecting my meal... :/ because the sauce was a good yogurt sauce and the pasta was good. Erin got pieces of ham and fries (very healthy lol), Caitlin got chicken with veggies and Beria got Kumpir, which is a baked potato with tons of stuff in it. It was really good, she got it with corn, pasta salad, cheese, ketchup, carrots and pasta salad I think. After dinner, we asked to smoke Nargile and play Tavla again, but the restaurant didn't have tavla, so we moved over to a different place and set up there. The nargile was stronger than Monday night when we smoked it (either that or my lungs hadn't quite recovered) because I had to stop smoking pretty quickly - it went straight to my head lol
After that, we went home and Caitlin packed because she was leaving the next day for Madrid! I just hung out with Erin since I wasn't leaving till Friday.
Thursday morning I woke up with the bed to myself since Cait went to catch her flight and Erin didn't have class till 2, so we had a nice lazy morning. We left together at 1:30 so she could get to class and I could meet Beria, who was going to be my tour guide for the day. She and I walked to Rumeli Castle, which was really cool and right on the Bosphorus river. It's one of the oldest castles in Turkey and you can go in and clamber (literally) all over the walls, which is a great workout - my calves were sore the next day! I loved it, the views were amazing and it was just really neat how you could wander all over the stairs and walls of this ancient castle. Some parts were a little questionable, though, because some of the staircases were narrow and of course there weren't guardrails, so you could be a few stories up with nothing but air between you and the ground (at times like this I realize I'm really my father's daughter. He wouldn't have liked that and I didn't either). Besides that, though, it was a really cool place, very quiet with beautiful views and scenery with green lawns, blooming flowers and green trees.
Then we walked along the river to Bebek, which is just another area of Istanbul, walked through a park, played on some "exercise" equipment in the park (think elliptical type things, but without any resistance) and then caught a bus to meet Erin at home. We all chilled for a little bit, ate some more hummus and then I cooked dinner :) I made pasta tossed with olive oil, sautéed garlic, tomatoes and a little bit of pesto sauce and we had veggies dipped in olive oil and balsamic or hummus and then chocolate for dessert. It was really good if I do say so myself. After dinner we chilled more and made some plans for Greece, it was basically a really nice, needed chill day.
Friday was my last day in Istanbul, so I wanted to go make sure I got in everything important I needed to see. First of all we woke up and worked on cleaning out Erin's fridge, so we had eggs and toast and then I went to go get the train tickets to Thessaloniki. After that I walked to Sultanahmet to go to the Hagia Sofia, determined to get in free using Erin's friend's student museum card (you get into museums for free or cheap with it) but the guard asked me for back up! Obviously I didn't have any, so they kicked me out and kept the card. I still kind of can't believe I got caught with a fake ID and all I was trying to do was go into a museum lol oh well. After that I fled to the Grand Bazaar to pick up some things: a Ronaldo jersey for a friend, and a new fake designer bag because mine was breaking :( I ended up getting a scarf, some ceramic pottery, two pairs of earrings, postcards a new bag and the jersey. oops? or good job? haha I don't know. Either way, from there I made my way back to Wonderland to meet Erin and Beria for lunch. Then E and I went back her appt to pack up for our weekend in Greece! We got to the train station early and got in our car and got excited about the prospect of a night car. That lasted about an hour of the 12 hour ride... lol The ride itself wasn't that bad (except the thermostat kept trying to sweat us to death - I swear that thing was possessed, we tried to put it on 20 degrees C (around 70 F) but it wanted to be at 30 C (~90 F). Whenever it was cool it was actually fairly comfortable, I was on the top bunk and she was on the bottom. The other not so fun part were the passport checks - we were woken up 4 times for passport checks. Twice leaving Turkey (once to take our passports, once to give them back an hour later), and twice entering Greece (again, once to take our PP and once to give them back).
We finally got to Thess around 11 on Saturday, a few hours later than we were supposed to get in, so we booked it to the hotel, dropped our things, changed and headed out in search of COFFEE. and food, but mostly coffee. We found a Starbucks and each got a frappe. I don't think I've ever tasted a more heavenly taste like ice cold smooth, creamy coffee after a 12+ hour train ride. From there we went in search of food, and found it without too much trouble. We got fried zucchini and tzatziki for an appetizer and I got chicken and fries (I didn't actually want fries, for some reason I thought they were going to be baked potatoes or something) and it was all reaallly good. Then we walked along the boardwalk to the White Tower to take pictures, which was cool, there was a good view. From there we walked through a park to a museum, but it turned out to be closed. so instead, we got coffee again, walked along the boardwalk again and then sat in the sun for a bit to wait for dinner time. While sitting, we got hit on by a 30something Nigerian man - that was fun - and I'm pretty sure my face got some color :) We decided we were hungry so we tried to find a taverna, because we heard you can bargain with them, but we didn't find any where we could bargain. So we just went to a restaurant and got dinner. I got a cucumber and tomato salad and then chicken souvlaki and fries. Once again, I didn't actually want the fries, but they came with it so I guess I had to take them lol. So from there we went back to the hotel and crashed.
Ok, well I'm almost caught up. I only have one more day of vaca to blog about and then I am all caught up!! However, I do have to get ready to go to dinner, so the grand finale shall have to wait. But I hope you enjoyed the novel (props if you read all the way thru!) peace out! :)
anyways, back to my trip to Istanbul.
Tuesday 4/6
We woke up late again and Erin had class so Caitlin and I had instructions to amuse ourselves with the Palaces: Dolma Baçhe and Topkapı. We went to the Dolma Baçhe, which we found out was the president's house and where Atatürk died, and Caitlin promptly made friends with a turkish guy around our age (I think) while waiting in line for tickets. He found out we were studying France and that we speak french and brought his cousin over. His cousin was actually pretty cool - he was a little bit older (around 30) and actually wasn't interested in us, it was so nice lol. He and I talked while Caitlin tried to avoid giving out any personal information to her new Turkish boyfriend. The cousin turned out to live in Metz, which is about am hour north-west of Strasbourg, so it was really fun talking to him. We got into the Palace (using a very sneaky ID handoff for a 9 YTL discount!) and evaded our new bfs, took a guided tour through the palace and then wandered around the grounds a bit. The Palace was really cool, with lots of beautiful paintings by mostly Italian painters, but it felt like we breezed through it and didnt really get to see a lot of them. Although, I guess the tour was supposed to be about the palace and not the paintings... but oh well.
After that we walked to Taksim, which is the main shopping/bar/restaurant area in Istanbul and we walked the main street there because Caitlin wanted to find Top Shop and I wanted to shop. Neither of us ended up getting anything but the street was cool anyways. From there we walked to a bus stop, got on a bus to go back to Erin's. We also stopped along the way and got breakfast supplies (since we just about killed her yogurt and cereal) and hummus. Oh my gosh the hummus was sooo good. I haven't had any since December I think, but it was amazing. We got home and obviously dug into the hummus with bread and veggies. Then we decided we wanted a more substantial meal, so we ordered in and got 2 chicken dishes and 2 salads for the 3 of us. It also came with bread and the chicken was delightfully spicy :) then it was time to get ready to go out! So we were all getting ready and Erin and her roommates "graciously" gave us the last of their rakı, which is the turkish liquor. It's mixed with water and it turns from a clear liquor into a milky white drink that tastes like black licorice with the burn of liquor. Delicious, let me tell you... (feel the sarcasm). So we had that before heading out. We went out in Taksim, stopping at a bar for some cheap drinks, then going somewhere else for better, more expensive drinks, and then finally going to Ritim Roof for some dancing.
The next day, Wednesday, we got up late again and Caitlin and I decided to go to a Turkish Bathhouse for a traditional turkish bath. What an experience. We went to Cagaloglu, the 300 year old historical hamam and got kind of ripped off (somehow the prices doubled from what we saw somewhere else... oh well), but we paid and got shown to our changing room. From there two LARGE turkish women took us to the hot room, where there were little alcoves all around with faucets of hot and cold water and basins. Oh, and LOTS of naked women. Like I said, experience. We're not used to that. But anyways, we sat by one of the faucets and basins and basically splashed ourselves for awhile, all the while getting more and more dehydrated. Eventually the LTW (Large Turkish Women) came back in and took us to the middle of the room, where there was a big marble slab. We laid down and they scrubbed all the dead skin off of us, then soaped us up and gave us a massage. It was kind of funny to be rolling around on the marble slab while these LTW soaped and suds us up lol, then took us to an alcove and rinsed us off, washed our hair and gave us "face massages" I'm not actually sure what my face massage was, but I think it was her wiping water off my face. Anyways, after that the LTW wrapped us in fluffy towels and took us back to our changing room. They gave us each a free gift of soap, a comb and Q-tips, and then sat outside the room while we changed. When we left, they were still sitting there and we thought they might've been waiting for a tip, but I honestly had no more money left and even if i did, I'm not sure the bath was worth the price, let alone an extra tip. But oh well, they were nice and we said thank you and left.
After that we walked to the Hagia Sofia, where we would've had to pay 20 YTL for a 30 min tour of the museum. No thanks. So instead, we went to a hotel cafe and got a snack :) Although, I'm pretty sure the hotel was probably a front operation for the turkish mafia. While we were there, a bunch of older turkish men in black suits walked into the hotel, said something the manager and walked down the stairs through a partially hidden door. Mafia, I'm telling you. lol
So after the once-in-a-lifetime (literally, never paying that much to be scrubbed and soaped by LTW ever again) and our snack in the Mafia hotel, Cait and I went to meet Erin and Beria at Kabataş and got on the ferry to go to Asia! So we cross the Bosphorus river, got coffee and baklava in a cafe, and then went back, but I have now officially been to 3 continents! Only have to get 4 more... lol
From there we went to a really neat part of Istanbul called Ortaköy. It's along the river and is a LOT less touristy than most of the places we'd seen. They had some street vendors selling jewelry and scarves, but nothing on the scale of the Grand Bazaar and it was just a lot calmer than the rest of the city. I really enjoyed it, it was probably my favorite part of Istanbul that I saw. We got dinner in a restaurant there too, I tried the mantı, which was good, but it was like ravioli and it had ground beef :( so I ended up disecting my meal... :/ because the sauce was a good yogurt sauce and the pasta was good. Erin got pieces of ham and fries (very healthy lol), Caitlin got chicken with veggies and Beria got Kumpir, which is a baked potato with tons of stuff in it. It was really good, she got it with corn, pasta salad, cheese, ketchup, carrots and pasta salad I think. After dinner, we asked to smoke Nargile and play Tavla again, but the restaurant didn't have tavla, so we moved over to a different place and set up there. The nargile was stronger than Monday night when we smoked it (either that or my lungs hadn't quite recovered) because I had to stop smoking pretty quickly - it went straight to my head lol
After that, we went home and Caitlin packed because she was leaving the next day for Madrid! I just hung out with Erin since I wasn't leaving till Friday.
Thursday morning I woke up with the bed to myself since Cait went to catch her flight and Erin didn't have class till 2, so we had a nice lazy morning. We left together at 1:30 so she could get to class and I could meet Beria, who was going to be my tour guide for the day. She and I walked to Rumeli Castle, which was really cool and right on the Bosphorus river. It's one of the oldest castles in Turkey and you can go in and clamber (literally) all over the walls, which is a great workout - my calves were sore the next day! I loved it, the views were amazing and it was just really neat how you could wander all over the stairs and walls of this ancient castle. Some parts were a little questionable, though, because some of the staircases were narrow and of course there weren't guardrails, so you could be a few stories up with nothing but air between you and the ground (at times like this I realize I'm really my father's daughter. He wouldn't have liked that and I didn't either). Besides that, though, it was a really cool place, very quiet with beautiful views and scenery with green lawns, blooming flowers and green trees.
Then we walked along the river to Bebek, which is just another area of Istanbul, walked through a park, played on some "exercise" equipment in the park (think elliptical type things, but without any resistance) and then caught a bus to meet Erin at home. We all chilled for a little bit, ate some more hummus and then I cooked dinner :) I made pasta tossed with olive oil, sautéed garlic, tomatoes and a little bit of pesto sauce and we had veggies dipped in olive oil and balsamic or hummus and then chocolate for dessert. It was really good if I do say so myself. After dinner we chilled more and made some plans for Greece, it was basically a really nice, needed chill day.
Friday was my last day in Istanbul, so I wanted to go make sure I got in everything important I needed to see. First of all we woke up and worked on cleaning out Erin's fridge, so we had eggs and toast and then I went to go get the train tickets to Thessaloniki. After that I walked to Sultanahmet to go to the Hagia Sofia, determined to get in free using Erin's friend's student museum card (you get into museums for free or cheap with it) but the guard asked me for back up! Obviously I didn't have any, so they kicked me out and kept the card. I still kind of can't believe I got caught with a fake ID and all I was trying to do was go into a museum lol oh well. After that I fled to the Grand Bazaar to pick up some things: a Ronaldo jersey for a friend, and a new fake designer bag because mine was breaking :( I ended up getting a scarf, some ceramic pottery, two pairs of earrings, postcards a new bag and the jersey. oops? or good job? haha I don't know. Either way, from there I made my way back to Wonderland to meet Erin and Beria for lunch. Then E and I went back her appt to pack up for our weekend in Greece! We got to the train station early and got in our car and got excited about the prospect of a night car. That lasted about an hour of the 12 hour ride... lol The ride itself wasn't that bad (except the thermostat kept trying to sweat us to death - I swear that thing was possessed, we tried to put it on 20 degrees C (around 70 F) but it wanted to be at 30 C (~90 F). Whenever it was cool it was actually fairly comfortable, I was on the top bunk and she was on the bottom. The other not so fun part were the passport checks - we were woken up 4 times for passport checks. Twice leaving Turkey (once to take our passports, once to give them back an hour later), and twice entering Greece (again, once to take our PP and once to give them back).
We finally got to Thess around 11 on Saturday, a few hours later than we were supposed to get in, so we booked it to the hotel, dropped our things, changed and headed out in search of COFFEE. and food, but mostly coffee. We found a Starbucks and each got a frappe. I don't think I've ever tasted a more heavenly taste like ice cold smooth, creamy coffee after a 12+ hour train ride. From there we went in search of food, and found it without too much trouble. We got fried zucchini and tzatziki for an appetizer and I got chicken and fries (I didn't actually want fries, for some reason I thought they were going to be baked potatoes or something) and it was all reaallly good. Then we walked along the boardwalk to the White Tower to take pictures, which was cool, there was a good view. From there we walked through a park to a museum, but it turned out to be closed. so instead, we got coffee again, walked along the boardwalk again and then sat in the sun for a bit to wait for dinner time. While sitting, we got hit on by a 30something Nigerian man - that was fun - and I'm pretty sure my face got some color :) We decided we were hungry so we tried to find a taverna, because we heard you can bargain with them, but we didn't find any where we could bargain. So we just went to a restaurant and got dinner. I got a cucumber and tomato salad and then chicken souvlaki and fries. Once again, I didn't actually want the fries, but they came with it so I guess I had to take them lol. So from there we went back to the hotel and crashed.
Ok, well I'm almost caught up. I only have one more day of vaca to blog about and then I am all caught up!! However, I do have to get ready to go to dinner, so the grand finale shall have to wait. But I hope you enjoyed the novel (props if you read all the way thru!) peace out! :)
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Easter in Budapest!
Well I apologize it's taking me so long to get everything from my notebook to my computer, I've been lacking in motivation lately. And I've been doing school work. sort of.
Anyways, I decided that blogging is a great method of procrastination and since I don't want to study anymore (because, really, the test I have to study for is annoying, I'm not being tested on my knowledge of anything, just on my quality of writing in French, so I really can't study anyways! boo.) so here's another day. What is this, day 4? Yeah, ok day 4 of my vaca (day 4 of... 11ish, 12 if you count the day I came home).
Sunday, 4/4 Easter!!
Yayyyy Easter. We all woke up at or around 830 and got ready to check out, showering, eating bfast, packing, etc. We got dressed for church (I wore a cute little sundress with leggings and a cardi) and we checked out. In addition to my church clothes, I also brought jeans and my brown shoes with me in a plastic bag so I could change after church because I didnt want to be running all over Buda (our plan for the day) in my flats and dress. So then we went to Mass at 11 at a Scottish Church because it was in English and we were all dying to have a service in our native language. However, it turned out to be Presbyterian. Oops! Oh well, it was a good service and the priest (is he still a priest in the Presbyterian Church?) and congregation were *so* welcoming. It was a rather long service and I actually didn't really like the homily (it was more like a Bible study of the passage, line by line interpretation. I'm a fan of the "big picture" type sermon à la the Catholic Church), but oh well, it was cool nonetheless. During the service, the priest took out some puppets and put on a little show for the kids so they would understand what was going on too - that part was in both Hungarian and English so it was funny and adorable. After mass there were cookies and coffee and tea and a free lunch that we were welcomed to stay for. However, as much as I love free food (a LOT) and as much as I wanted to stay and talk to the people who were so incredibly nice to us, I really wanted to see the other side of the city, the Buda side. So Caitlin, Olivia and I decided to forego the free food and head for the hills instead. Well, we changed first, then we headed for said hills.
We started by walking to the Chain Bridge, which is the oldest bridge in Budapest (or something like that) and then we walked across, snapping pics along the way of course :) We walked to Fisherman's Bastion, which had amazing views, but was under construction so I was a little disappointed :( Oh well. While we were there, we saw St. Matthias Church. We didn't go in because at this point, all the big beautiful churches and cathedrals and basilicas are starting to look alike. We basically walked from the middle of Buda starting from Fisherman's Bastion, to the Southern end, the Liberty monument and hit most of the major tourist attractions along the way. After the bastion and the church, we walked by the Palace (we think) and the Parliament (we know). We were walking by ruins and we were supposed to be walking by the Palace, so we assumed the ruins were the Palace. That's why we weren't sure. Then we climbed to the top of the Liberty monument and man, I am out of shape! That climb was rough... i'm not looking forward to climbing up the million dollar stairs again after that embarrassment. But, the view was pretty spectacular. You could literally see everything. And the visibility was good too, sunny, not too many clouds and no fog or anything obscuring the view. We had some time to kill then (mostly because we booked it through the earlier attractions of Buda) so we decided to pretend we were (don't judge) models/flower children and took "artistic" pics of ourselves. It was funny and amusing and great and all that because we were just being ridiculous (go check out my pics to see what I mean). From there we walked back down, all the while taking pictures of flowers or picking flowers to put in our hair or just generally continuing our "flower children" state of mind. We got to the bottom and walked back to the Pest side via the green bridge (I don't know its real name lol). Funny story: the three of us are just walking along in Pest, minding our own business when Olivia runs across someone she thinks she recognizes. She does a double take, just as he's doing a double take also, then they both realize who the other is and go, "Oh my god it's you!" It was a guy who used to go to BC but transferred to Columbia after freshman year. His name was Kyle and I actually met him a few times, but it took me awhile to remember where (in the Choco Bar). Hilarious. He's currently studying abroad in Budapest and said he loves it. Funny how small the wold is, sometimes.
Anyways, we continued walking to the restaurant where we were meeting Erin and Beria. We were about 5 min late, as usual, but its ok they were right on time so not waiting long. Caitlin and I had found a restaurant that was a Hungarian buffet the night before, so we decided to eat there for our Easter dinner. We got a bottle of champagne and shared it and then we started going at the food. They had appetizers, sides, meats, cheeses, a grill where you could get all different kinds of meat cooked (I got some beef, venison, chicken and turkey I think) and DESSERT. They had tiramisu, some kind of custardy thing, little pieces of different kinds of cakes, chocolate sauce, fruit, and oh jeez I'm getting hungry all over again just from thinking about it! so yeah, we stuffed ourselves and then rolled back to the hostel to pick up our bags to get to the airport.
We got to the airport in plenty of time and sat around talking for awhile. Then we went to our respective gates (Erin, Caitlin, Beria and I to ours and Olivia to hers because she was flying back to Spain). Our gate contained annoying, loud women who I swear were in their 30s but dressed like they were 15. Think, Juicy monochrome velour jumpsuits with teddy bears. Oh and they had bleach blonde hair, about an inch of make up on and were *blaring* techno club music. The cherry on top was when they glared at us like we were doing something wrong when all we did was sit there. We weren't even glaring at them! although I did have the urge to go sit with them and chit chat, just to see their reaction. But I didn't want to get on their pimp's bad side, so I refrained. (I really think they were either escorts, prostitutes or were with members of the Hungarian mafia. not quite sure why... but oh well).
We got on our plane, flew to Istanbul and landed without any major incident. In the Istanbul Airport we got our visitor's visa and picked up my bag then got a cab back to erin's where we all passed out.
[Flash to real life:] Still refusing to do work, now I'm sitting outside on the porch because its a beautiful day and I figure I'll just keep going.
Monday, 4/5 Istanbul!!
We slept in pretty late (till like 11ish I think) and then got up to meet Erin's friends for lunch/our breakfast at a café called Wonderland, where its based off of, you guessed it, Alice in Wonderland. it was cool inside and they had really good food. I got a chicken wrap that was nice and spicy (I feel like I tried to get everything spicy that I could find on this trip because we never have spicy food in France). After that we went to get Erin's ID card, we saw her school, and I am so jealous because not only does she have the most amazing view of the Bosphorus, but she has a campus! With green areas! And students lounging! Lol, it really reminded me of the dustbowl at BC. Anyways, we realized we needed caffeine, so we got some coffee and then headed to Sultanahmet, the touristy area. We went to see the Hagia Sofia, which was closed because it was Monday, so we walked about 100 yards to the Blue Mosque. I've never been inside a mosque before so that was really cool. The architecture is really different also, its all about domes and those pointy things on the outside (the name escapes me right now...) and not about arches and towers, like Catholic cathedrals. To go inside, we had to cover our shoulders and take off our shoes, which we carried in little bags until we exited. Then from there we walked like 200 yards to the Cisterns, which were cool too, but not really my thing. They used to pump water to the Palaces, I think. Anyways, check out the pics for both the Blue Mosque and the Cisterns.
After that we met Beria, who took us to the Grand Bazaar. It was amazing, it was huge and you could get lost in there, but we didn't because we had Beria :) the people there are funny too, they try to hit on you to get you to buy their goods and their favorite line to Caitlin was, "wait, you dropped something! [pause] My heart!" and then they'd crack up. After that happened about 3 times, after they said you dropped something, she replied, what? your heart? and they stopped laughing. Yeah, so that was funny, and bargaining was a different experience, especially if you picked up something that you weren't actually interested in. I picked up a fake Gucci leather wallet which the vender originally tried to sell to me for 30 YTL (new turkish lira) and I wasn't actually that interested in buying it, but he kept lowering his price whenever I tried to say no thank you. Most people only went down to maybe 60% of the original asking price but he went all the way down to 10 YTL as I was finally walking away. I did buy some things, though. I got a pretty blue scarf and some gifts for people. Caitlin got 3 jerseys and 2 scarves, Beria got silver earrings and a ring and Erin got a scarf for her mom.
From there it was another short walk to the Spice Bazaar, which I might've liked even more than the Grand Bazaar because there were free samples of turkish delight! We bought two boxes of them for later that night too :)
Then we walked across the Galata Bridge and took pics of the pretty sunset. At the end of the bridge, we got on the tram and took it to Tophane, where we went and smoked Nargile (hookah) and got wraps and some kind of cheesy bread type thing, both of which were really good. I also learned how to play Tavla (backgammon) and played against Beria a few times. We also got çay (tea, pronounced chai) and the Nargile lasted awhile, we were all feeling it when it finally ran out and we headed home.
All in all, a great first day in Istanbul, much more to come soon, I'll try to update again tomorrow :)
bises~
Anyways, I decided that blogging is a great method of procrastination and since I don't want to study anymore (because, really, the test I have to study for is annoying, I'm not being tested on my knowledge of anything, just on my quality of writing in French, so I really can't study anyways! boo.) so here's another day. What is this, day 4? Yeah, ok day 4 of my vaca (day 4 of... 11ish, 12 if you count the day I came home).
Sunday, 4/4 Easter!!
Yayyyy Easter. We all woke up at or around 830 and got ready to check out, showering, eating bfast, packing, etc. We got dressed for church (I wore a cute little sundress with leggings and a cardi) and we checked out. In addition to my church clothes, I also brought jeans and my brown shoes with me in a plastic bag so I could change after church because I didnt want to be running all over Buda (our plan for the day) in my flats and dress. So then we went to Mass at 11 at a Scottish Church because it was in English and we were all dying to have a service in our native language. However, it turned out to be Presbyterian. Oops! Oh well, it was a good service and the priest (is he still a priest in the Presbyterian Church?) and congregation were *so* welcoming. It was a rather long service and I actually didn't really like the homily (it was more like a Bible study of the passage, line by line interpretation. I'm a fan of the "big picture" type sermon à la the Catholic Church), but oh well, it was cool nonetheless. During the service, the priest took out some puppets and put on a little show for the kids so they would understand what was going on too - that part was in both Hungarian and English so it was funny and adorable. After mass there were cookies and coffee and tea and a free lunch that we were welcomed to stay for. However, as much as I love free food (a LOT) and as much as I wanted to stay and talk to the people who were so incredibly nice to us, I really wanted to see the other side of the city, the Buda side. So Caitlin, Olivia and I decided to forego the free food and head for the hills instead. Well, we changed first, then we headed for said hills.
We started by walking to the Chain Bridge, which is the oldest bridge in Budapest (or something like that) and then we walked across, snapping pics along the way of course :) We walked to Fisherman's Bastion, which had amazing views, but was under construction so I was a little disappointed :( Oh well. While we were there, we saw St. Matthias Church. We didn't go in because at this point, all the big beautiful churches and cathedrals and basilicas are starting to look alike. We basically walked from the middle of Buda starting from Fisherman's Bastion, to the Southern end, the Liberty monument and hit most of the major tourist attractions along the way. After the bastion and the church, we walked by the Palace (we think) and the Parliament (we know). We were walking by ruins and we were supposed to be walking by the Palace, so we assumed the ruins were the Palace. That's why we weren't sure. Then we climbed to the top of the Liberty monument and man, I am out of shape! That climb was rough... i'm not looking forward to climbing up the million dollar stairs again after that embarrassment. But, the view was pretty spectacular. You could literally see everything. And the visibility was good too, sunny, not too many clouds and no fog or anything obscuring the view. We had some time to kill then (mostly because we booked it through the earlier attractions of Buda) so we decided to pretend we were (don't judge) models/flower children and took "artistic" pics of ourselves. It was funny and amusing and great and all that because we were just being ridiculous (go check out my pics to see what I mean). From there we walked back down, all the while taking pictures of flowers or picking flowers to put in our hair or just generally continuing our "flower children" state of mind. We got to the bottom and walked back to the Pest side via the green bridge (I don't know its real name lol). Funny story: the three of us are just walking along in Pest, minding our own business when Olivia runs across someone she thinks she recognizes. She does a double take, just as he's doing a double take also, then they both realize who the other is and go, "Oh my god it's you!" It was a guy who used to go to BC but transferred to Columbia after freshman year. His name was Kyle and I actually met him a few times, but it took me awhile to remember where (in the Choco Bar). Hilarious. He's currently studying abroad in Budapest and said he loves it. Funny how small the wold is, sometimes.
Anyways, we continued walking to the restaurant where we were meeting Erin and Beria. We were about 5 min late, as usual, but its ok they were right on time so not waiting long. Caitlin and I had found a restaurant that was a Hungarian buffet the night before, so we decided to eat there for our Easter dinner. We got a bottle of champagne and shared it and then we started going at the food. They had appetizers, sides, meats, cheeses, a grill where you could get all different kinds of meat cooked (I got some beef, venison, chicken and turkey I think) and DESSERT. They had tiramisu, some kind of custardy thing, little pieces of different kinds of cakes, chocolate sauce, fruit, and oh jeez I'm getting hungry all over again just from thinking about it! so yeah, we stuffed ourselves and then rolled back to the hostel to pick up our bags to get to the airport.
We got to the airport in plenty of time and sat around talking for awhile. Then we went to our respective gates (Erin, Caitlin, Beria and I to ours and Olivia to hers because she was flying back to Spain). Our gate contained annoying, loud women who I swear were in their 30s but dressed like they were 15. Think, Juicy monochrome velour jumpsuits with teddy bears. Oh and they had bleach blonde hair, about an inch of make up on and were *blaring* techno club music. The cherry on top was when they glared at us like we were doing something wrong when all we did was sit there. We weren't even glaring at them! although I did have the urge to go sit with them and chit chat, just to see their reaction. But I didn't want to get on their pimp's bad side, so I refrained. (I really think they were either escorts, prostitutes or were with members of the Hungarian mafia. not quite sure why... but oh well).
We got on our plane, flew to Istanbul and landed without any major incident. In the Istanbul Airport we got our visitor's visa and picked up my bag then got a cab back to erin's where we all passed out.
[Flash to real life:] Still refusing to do work, now I'm sitting outside on the porch because its a beautiful day and I figure I'll just keep going.
Monday, 4/5 Istanbul!!
We slept in pretty late (till like 11ish I think) and then got up to meet Erin's friends for lunch/our breakfast at a café called Wonderland, where its based off of, you guessed it, Alice in Wonderland. it was cool inside and they had really good food. I got a chicken wrap that was nice and spicy (I feel like I tried to get everything spicy that I could find on this trip because we never have spicy food in France). After that we went to get Erin's ID card, we saw her school, and I am so jealous because not only does she have the most amazing view of the Bosphorus, but she has a campus! With green areas! And students lounging! Lol, it really reminded me of the dustbowl at BC. Anyways, we realized we needed caffeine, so we got some coffee and then headed to Sultanahmet, the touristy area. We went to see the Hagia Sofia, which was closed because it was Monday, so we walked about 100 yards to the Blue Mosque. I've never been inside a mosque before so that was really cool. The architecture is really different also, its all about domes and those pointy things on the outside (the name escapes me right now...) and not about arches and towers, like Catholic cathedrals. To go inside, we had to cover our shoulders and take off our shoes, which we carried in little bags until we exited. Then from there we walked like 200 yards to the Cisterns, which were cool too, but not really my thing. They used to pump water to the Palaces, I think. Anyways, check out the pics for both the Blue Mosque and the Cisterns.
After that we met Beria, who took us to the Grand Bazaar. It was amazing, it was huge and you could get lost in there, but we didn't because we had Beria :) the people there are funny too, they try to hit on you to get you to buy their goods and their favorite line to Caitlin was, "wait, you dropped something! [pause] My heart!" and then they'd crack up. After that happened about 3 times, after they said you dropped something, she replied, what? your heart? and they stopped laughing. Yeah, so that was funny, and bargaining was a different experience, especially if you picked up something that you weren't actually interested in. I picked up a fake Gucci leather wallet which the vender originally tried to sell to me for 30 YTL (new turkish lira) and I wasn't actually that interested in buying it, but he kept lowering his price whenever I tried to say no thank you. Most people only went down to maybe 60% of the original asking price but he went all the way down to 10 YTL as I was finally walking away. I did buy some things, though. I got a pretty blue scarf and some gifts for people. Caitlin got 3 jerseys and 2 scarves, Beria got silver earrings and a ring and Erin got a scarf for her mom.
From there it was another short walk to the Spice Bazaar, which I might've liked even more than the Grand Bazaar because there were free samples of turkish delight! We bought two boxes of them for later that night too :)
Then we walked across the Galata Bridge and took pics of the pretty sunset. At the end of the bridge, we got on the tram and took it to Tophane, where we went and smoked Nargile (hookah) and got wraps and some kind of cheesy bread type thing, both of which were really good. I also learned how to play Tavla (backgammon) and played against Beria a few times. We also got çay (tea, pronounced chai) and the Nargile lasted awhile, we were all feeling it when it finally ran out and we headed home.
All in all, a great first day in Istanbul, much more to come soon, I'll try to update again tomorrow :)
bises~
Saturday, April 17, 2010
budaaaa encore
The next day, Saturday 4/3, we woke up and had a great breakfast! The hostel people make waffles every morning! it was awesome. They also had coffee, tea, bread, jam, butter, nutella, cereal and milk. It was great. I love free breakfasts lol. We planned our day (sort of). Our plan for the day included going to the Market, walking down Vaci Utca, buying cute clothes for cheap, hitting up the Museum of Terror and finally taking a bath in the Hungarian bathhouse. As you will see, our day didn't quite turn out like that, but it was still a great day :)
First all of us went to the Market and just walked around there, looked at souvenirs and things, everyone got a few things. Then we walked down Vaci Utca, the fashion street where we stopped for lunch (I got goulash and it was so good!). We continued on our way down Vaci Utca and lost Erin and Beria to the Hop on/Hop off tour lol so they saw all of the city for a few hours while we wandered around randomly, stopping in stores when we wanted, getting hot wine at markets that we stumbled upon, etc. From there we walked down Andrassy, which was the "Champs Elysées" of Budapest, and also the street on which St. Stephens, the Opera House and the Museum of Terror (Museum about the occupation of Hungary by Communism) are located. The Opera house was Olivia's stop since she was meeting some friends to see a show there. Caitlin and I continued on our way and decided we weren't going to make it to the bath, but we might as well go into the Museum of Terror. However, we got there at 5:30, thinking it closed at 7, when in reality it closed at 6. The woman working the desk was also rude because she wouldn't give us the advertised student discount. So we said oh well and left and continued on our merry way down Andrassy. The street ends at Hero's Square which also connects to a park so we went into the park, found a random castle (I love how you can run into castles and cathedrals and other gigantic buildings in Europe. Like in Strasbourg, while walking around the centre ville, you can just turn and be like oh, well hey there enormous cathedral. lol) and then realized we were again going to be late to meet Erin and Beria for dinner. So we turned back and walked back to the hostel.
We met up with Erin, Beria and Olivia (who realized earlier that her Opera ticket was for SUNDAY night, not SATURDAY night... oops!) and started on our way to find this restaurant that Erin's prof had recommended to her: Rosé. We found it on this little side street and went in to be immediately greeted with live music by a violin and weird piano-esque instrument (it looked like someone took the top of a piano off and he was playing with a modified drumstick with soft material wrapped around the top by pinging the strings. I just butchered that description but if anyone knows what I'm talking about, please let me know what type of instrument it was, I'm curious). Anyways, we ordered and were *starving* by the time the food came (that's not to say the service was bad, it was very good, but you know, in Europe, they eat on different schedules). I got chicken wrapped in bacon stuffed with sundried tomatoes with capers a mixed salad on the side. Ohmigosh it was divine. Maybe not the most Hungarian of meals, with the vegetables and lack of sour cream, but still, it was SO good. I only wish I got more of it because I wasn't full at the end. So I promptly offered to finish anyone's meal who needed help and Caitlin offered me her plate, which I gladly accepted and then shoveled into my mouth. After that, we decided that our meals were great so we might as well keep going and get some dessert. We ordered 2 desserts to share: tiramisu and spongecake. We finished both of them in oh... I'd say 86 seconds. Or less. lol it was a little ridiculous, but they were just so delicious!
After dinner we sat and digested for a little and planned our next moves. We had a meeting with 2 other BC kids at the Opera House (in the opposite direction from our hostel), so Caitlin and Olivia decided they would walk there and get them and meet the rest of us (me, Erin and Beria) at the bar across the street, Old Man's Pub. So we all headed off in our respective directions. E, B and I found a table and sat down and since we were sitting, we kind of had to buy a drink, so we each got a beer. We waited for a while, then we decided the others probably were there and so we started making sweeps of the bar. We waited a little longer and the place started pumping, playing 80s american music and all these girls who looked about 15 were coming in will belly baring shirts and skin tight jeans and about then we decided we could've made that place fun... last night. Tonight we were too tired and just wanted to sleep. So we went back to the hostel and did just that.
And now, its time for me to enjoy the sunshine in Strasbourg because i finished my paper so I'm going to go sit in the sun and read :) bises à tous
First all of us went to the Market and just walked around there, looked at souvenirs and things, everyone got a few things. Then we walked down Vaci Utca, the fashion street where we stopped for lunch (I got goulash and it was so good!). We continued on our way down Vaci Utca and lost Erin and Beria to the Hop on/Hop off tour lol so they saw all of the city for a few hours while we wandered around randomly, stopping in stores when we wanted, getting hot wine at markets that we stumbled upon, etc. From there we walked down Andrassy, which was the "Champs Elysées" of Budapest, and also the street on which St. Stephens, the Opera House and the Museum of Terror (Museum about the occupation of Hungary by Communism) are located. The Opera house was Olivia's stop since she was meeting some friends to see a show there. Caitlin and I continued on our way and decided we weren't going to make it to the bath, but we might as well go into the Museum of Terror. However, we got there at 5:30, thinking it closed at 7, when in reality it closed at 6. The woman working the desk was also rude because she wouldn't give us the advertised student discount. So we said oh well and left and continued on our merry way down Andrassy. The street ends at Hero's Square which also connects to a park so we went into the park, found a random castle (I love how you can run into castles and cathedrals and other gigantic buildings in Europe. Like in Strasbourg, while walking around the centre ville, you can just turn and be like oh, well hey there enormous cathedral. lol) and then realized we were again going to be late to meet Erin and Beria for dinner. So we turned back and walked back to the hostel.
We met up with Erin, Beria and Olivia (who realized earlier that her Opera ticket was for SUNDAY night, not SATURDAY night... oops!) and started on our way to find this restaurant that Erin's prof had recommended to her: Rosé. We found it on this little side street and went in to be immediately greeted with live music by a violin and weird piano-esque instrument (it looked like someone took the top of a piano off and he was playing with a modified drumstick with soft material wrapped around the top by pinging the strings. I just butchered that description but if anyone knows what I'm talking about, please let me know what type of instrument it was, I'm curious). Anyways, we ordered and were *starving* by the time the food came (that's not to say the service was bad, it was very good, but you know, in Europe, they eat on different schedules). I got chicken wrapped in bacon stuffed with sundried tomatoes with capers a mixed salad on the side. Ohmigosh it was divine. Maybe not the most Hungarian of meals, with the vegetables and lack of sour cream, but still, it was SO good. I only wish I got more of it because I wasn't full at the end. So I promptly offered to finish anyone's meal who needed help and Caitlin offered me her plate, which I gladly accepted and then shoveled into my mouth. After that, we decided that our meals were great so we might as well keep going and get some dessert. We ordered 2 desserts to share: tiramisu and spongecake. We finished both of them in oh... I'd say 86 seconds. Or less. lol it was a little ridiculous, but they were just so delicious!
After dinner we sat and digested for a little and planned our next moves. We had a meeting with 2 other BC kids at the Opera House (in the opposite direction from our hostel), so Caitlin and Olivia decided they would walk there and get them and meet the rest of us (me, Erin and Beria) at the bar across the street, Old Man's Pub. So we all headed off in our respective directions. E, B and I found a table and sat down and since we were sitting, we kind of had to buy a drink, so we each got a beer. We waited for a while, then we decided the others probably were there and so we started making sweeps of the bar. We waited a little longer and the place started pumping, playing 80s american music and all these girls who looked about 15 were coming in will belly baring shirts and skin tight jeans and about then we decided we could've made that place fun... last night. Tonight we were too tired and just wanted to sleep. So we went back to the hostel and did just that.
And now, its time for me to enjoy the sunshine in Strasbourg because i finished my paper so I'm going to go sit in the sun and read :) bises à tous
buda buda buda budaaa
So, eastward adventure blog post #2.
Only because certain people (*ahem* Joanie *ahem*) keep pestering me to write more (haha kidding, thanks for the emails, they keep me motivated lol)
Thus, Friday 4/2 Caitlin, Olivia and I woke up in Budapest! Before going we had had a little trouble booking our hostels because we booked one for Friday and Saturday with Erin and her friend Beria, but then when we tried to get it for Thursday night also, it was somehow already filled up! So we had to book a different one for Thursday night. Anyways, when we woke up Friday morning, we had breakfast (free from the hostel - we only stay places with free bfast haha), and we had to strip the beds and check out of our first hostel so we could go and check into our other hostel lol. We checked out by 10 and got to the other one, Aboriginal Hostel around 1030. That one was great. It had all these cool decorations inside and a common room with couches and lounge chairs and a TV with movies and games! It was definitely the nicest one I'd stayed in. And the people who ran it were awesome as well - we couldn't check in right away because the other people hadn't checked out yet, but we could leave our bags there and the guy there gave us a "virtual tour" of Budapest. It was really cute because he had just finished giving the *exact* same virtual tour to a group of girls before us (american girls studying abroad - one was from Connecticut and knew some of the same people as Caitlin and Erin, who are also from CT haha), but he was so enthusiastic about his tour lol. So we sat down and he circled the major spots to see on the map. Afterwards, the map was barely legible because apparently ALL of Budapest is something to see (I swear, there were circles and X's and underlinings everywhere, we literally couldn't use the map anymore lol). So we kind of just headed out. We had planned on taking a walking tour at 2, but we couldn't find it so we gave ourselves a walking tour. I was the tour guide with my Let's Go Europe 2010 book haha, so whenever we went somewhere, I'd look it up in the book and read the little blurb.
I guess before I describe exactly what we did, there are two sides to Budapest (really, three, but we only saw two sides) - Buda and Pest. Buda is on the hill, across the Danube from where we stayed all three nights. It's where the Parliament, Fisherman's Bastion and Matthias Church are located; I got the impression that Buda is the richer, more historical side while Pest is the more industrial, working class side. That's not to say Pest is the slums, not at all, Pest was really cool also! But there was more construction and more "communist" looking buildings in Pest. There was also less green space in Pest, it was very much a city (at least, where we stayed it was).
Anyways, the first day we stayed around Pest and saw things there: the Opera House and St. Stephen's Basilica, complete with the 1000 year old mummified hand of St. Stephen -- sweet... lol not that you could actually see it, it was on "display" in a dark little box and you had to pay to turn the light on. So, we waited for a few min for someone else to turn on the light. fail. I think everyone else there had the same idea as us lol. Then we went up to the top where there was a panoramic view and took lots of pics and just kind of hung out admiring the view (I was actually recovering from my vertigo due to the 13 million winding staircases to the top, you know, the old ones that wind around a pole and make you all dizzy from walking in circles a thousand times? yeah those all the way to the top of the Basilica. no fun lol) So yeah, we hung out up there and then we saw a little café called "California Coffee" and were like we need to go there! So we headed back down and went to the coffeeshop where the menu was in English and they had things like mochas and filtered coffee. It was amazing. I got a mocha, which I don't usually get at home but I got it there because it was the first place I'd seen it (besides Starbucks, where everything is insanely overpriced - 7 euro for a latte? no thanks.)
So we all had our coffees and were sitting and enjoying then when an... elderly gentleman... sat down next to us and started talking to us. Well, more specifically, started talking to Caitlin. Apparently he's a former pro hockey player who played for the Czech Republic (although I suppose it would've been Czechoslovakia when he played for them) in the world cup, twice. And he has an oil business in Canada, which he started after he finished his career as a doctor. He also told us/her that he has a private jet, used to have a 23 year old girlfriend, and a Canadian passport (I'm not sure of the importance of that one, but he was really into his Canadian passport...). He also offered to fly Caitlin to Cancun in his private jet and then fly her back to Strasbourg. It was hilarious. The girl has a serious magnet for potential kidnappers. His friends were funny too because they were so normal! I was talking to one guy who seemed pretty legit, he had hockey camps on the Cape I think and he had a few in Aspen. He said he was a former pro hockey player (but I actually believed he used to play, as opposed to the Cait's boyfriend, we weren't sure what to believe) and talked to me about his camps. But he didn't talk to me in the creepy way that Caitlin's boyfriend talked to her lol. Their other friend just sat there silently, looking mortified that his 60+ year old friend was hitting on a 20 year old girl. All in all, he was harmless, but amusing and kept offering to buy us things from the café, but we kept trying to leave so we didn't profit at all (well, Caitlin got his business card and hotel address LOL).
From there we went to the Great Synagogue, but it was closed, so we just took pics from the outside and then went back to the hostel to check in for real. We met Erin and her friend Beria there, and it was SO great to see Erin again. I really like all the people in my program, but it was soo nice to see a friend from BC again (I consider the people in my program friends from BC, but I didn't really know them before I came to France, so it was awesome seeing her since she and I hung out a fair amount at school before going abroad). We all met up and then went to dinner at a place the hostel guy recommended for us called Stex. Honestly it was just alright, not quite up to par with what we expected from Hungarian cooking. But thats ok, the wine was good and company was great :)
Then we went back to the hostel and there we re-met the girls from that morning and they were really coo! they were backpacking across Europe (a day in Prague, day in Vienna, day in Buda, etc kind of thing) and so we all decided to go out together with an really cool couple. The couple were a man and woman (he was mid 30s I think and she was early 40s) finishing up a 7 month long tour of Europe with Budapest and a few days in England with their friends. They took us to this really cool ruins pub called Szimpla. A ruins pub is kind of hard to describe, but its an old building that's going to be torn down soon, but someone buys it and turns it into a pub. They don't really fix it up, just make it safe and suitable for a drinking atmosphere and maybe add some decorations, but it really has the feel like you're drinking beer in a building that's been bombed. I'm not sure how to describe it but it was really cool. I also talked to the couple a little while we were there and they were so cool! I hope when I'm in my 30s I'll be like them - really laid back (they took like 12 20-22 year olds out to a bar with them!) and they travelled the world just for fun. They were also from San José I think and they were asian! haha I feel like I notice minorities (especially asians) so much more now just because I never see them! Anyways we all hung out there and had a drink or two and then we decided to go to this club, Gödor, but it ended up being closed so we just went back to the hostel and slept.
Anndddd... now I'm sleepy haha so I'll continue tomorrow... why do I make such detailed lists of my trips? it makes it very difficult to post about it in a timely fashion because it takes so long! Oh well, Joanie I hope you enjoyed this one since I wrote it especially for you :) nighty night!
Only because certain people (*ahem* Joanie *ahem*) keep pestering me to write more (haha kidding, thanks for the emails, they keep me motivated lol)
Thus, Friday 4/2 Caitlin, Olivia and I woke up in Budapest! Before going we had had a little trouble booking our hostels because we booked one for Friday and Saturday with Erin and her friend Beria, but then when we tried to get it for Thursday night also, it was somehow already filled up! So we had to book a different one for Thursday night. Anyways, when we woke up Friday morning, we had breakfast (free from the hostel - we only stay places with free bfast haha), and we had to strip the beds and check out of our first hostel so we could go and check into our other hostel lol. We checked out by 10 and got to the other one, Aboriginal Hostel around 1030. That one was great. It had all these cool decorations inside and a common room with couches and lounge chairs and a TV with movies and games! It was definitely the nicest one I'd stayed in. And the people who ran it were awesome as well - we couldn't check in right away because the other people hadn't checked out yet, but we could leave our bags there and the guy there gave us a "virtual tour" of Budapest. It was really cute because he had just finished giving the *exact* same virtual tour to a group of girls before us (american girls studying abroad - one was from Connecticut and knew some of the same people as Caitlin and Erin, who are also from CT haha), but he was so enthusiastic about his tour lol. So we sat down and he circled the major spots to see on the map. Afterwards, the map was barely legible because apparently ALL of Budapest is something to see (I swear, there were circles and X's and underlinings everywhere, we literally couldn't use the map anymore lol). So we kind of just headed out. We had planned on taking a walking tour at 2, but we couldn't find it so we gave ourselves a walking tour. I was the tour guide with my Let's Go Europe 2010 book haha, so whenever we went somewhere, I'd look it up in the book and read the little blurb.
I guess before I describe exactly what we did, there are two sides to Budapest (really, three, but we only saw two sides) - Buda and Pest. Buda is on the hill, across the Danube from where we stayed all three nights. It's where the Parliament, Fisherman's Bastion and Matthias Church are located; I got the impression that Buda is the richer, more historical side while Pest is the more industrial, working class side. That's not to say Pest is the slums, not at all, Pest was really cool also! But there was more construction and more "communist" looking buildings in Pest. There was also less green space in Pest, it was very much a city (at least, where we stayed it was).
Anyways, the first day we stayed around Pest and saw things there: the Opera House and St. Stephen's Basilica, complete with the 1000 year old mummified hand of St. Stephen -- sweet... lol not that you could actually see it, it was on "display" in a dark little box and you had to pay to turn the light on. So, we waited for a few min for someone else to turn on the light. fail. I think everyone else there had the same idea as us lol. Then we went up to the top where there was a panoramic view and took lots of pics and just kind of hung out admiring the view (I was actually recovering from my vertigo due to the 13 million winding staircases to the top, you know, the old ones that wind around a pole and make you all dizzy from walking in circles a thousand times? yeah those all the way to the top of the Basilica. no fun lol) So yeah, we hung out up there and then we saw a little café called "California Coffee" and were like we need to go there! So we headed back down and went to the coffeeshop where the menu was in English and they had things like mochas and filtered coffee. It was amazing. I got a mocha, which I don't usually get at home but I got it there because it was the first place I'd seen it (besides Starbucks, where everything is insanely overpriced - 7 euro for a latte? no thanks.)
So we all had our coffees and were sitting and enjoying then when an... elderly gentleman... sat down next to us and started talking to us. Well, more specifically, started talking to Caitlin. Apparently he's a former pro hockey player who played for the Czech Republic (although I suppose it would've been Czechoslovakia when he played for them) in the world cup, twice. And he has an oil business in Canada, which he started after he finished his career as a doctor. He also told us/her that he has a private jet, used to have a 23 year old girlfriend, and a Canadian passport (I'm not sure of the importance of that one, but he was really into his Canadian passport...). He also offered to fly Caitlin to Cancun in his private jet and then fly her back to Strasbourg. It was hilarious. The girl has a serious magnet for potential kidnappers. His friends were funny too because they were so normal! I was talking to one guy who seemed pretty legit, he had hockey camps on the Cape I think and he had a few in Aspen. He said he was a former pro hockey player (but I actually believed he used to play, as opposed to the Cait's boyfriend, we weren't sure what to believe) and talked to me about his camps. But he didn't talk to me in the creepy way that Caitlin's boyfriend talked to her lol. Their other friend just sat there silently, looking mortified that his 60+ year old friend was hitting on a 20 year old girl. All in all, he was harmless, but amusing and kept offering to buy us things from the café, but we kept trying to leave so we didn't profit at all (well, Caitlin got his business card and hotel address LOL).
From there we went to the Great Synagogue, but it was closed, so we just took pics from the outside and then went back to the hostel to check in for real. We met Erin and her friend Beria there, and it was SO great to see Erin again. I really like all the people in my program, but it was soo nice to see a friend from BC again (I consider the people in my program friends from BC, but I didn't really know them before I came to France, so it was awesome seeing her since she and I hung out a fair amount at school before going abroad). We all met up and then went to dinner at a place the hostel guy recommended for us called Stex. Honestly it was just alright, not quite up to par with what we expected from Hungarian cooking. But thats ok, the wine was good and company was great :)
Then we went back to the hostel and there we re-met the girls from that morning and they were really coo! they were backpacking across Europe (a day in Prague, day in Vienna, day in Buda, etc kind of thing) and so we all decided to go out together with an really cool couple. The couple were a man and woman (he was mid 30s I think and she was early 40s) finishing up a 7 month long tour of Europe with Budapest and a few days in England with their friends. They took us to this really cool ruins pub called Szimpla. A ruins pub is kind of hard to describe, but its an old building that's going to be torn down soon, but someone buys it and turns it into a pub. They don't really fix it up, just make it safe and suitable for a drinking atmosphere and maybe add some decorations, but it really has the feel like you're drinking beer in a building that's been bombed. I'm not sure how to describe it but it was really cool. I also talked to the couple a little while we were there and they were so cool! I hope when I'm in my 30s I'll be like them - really laid back (they took like 12 20-22 year olds out to a bar with them!) and they travelled the world just for fun. They were also from San José I think and they were asian! haha I feel like I notice minorities (especially asians) so much more now just because I never see them! Anyways we all hung out there and had a drink or two and then we decided to go to this club, Gödor, but it ended up being closed so we just went back to the hostel and slept.
Anndddd... now I'm sleepy haha so I'll continue tomorrow... why do I make such detailed lists of my trips? it makes it very difficult to post about it in a timely fashion because it takes so long! Oh well, Joanie I hope you enjoyed this one since I wrote it especially for you :) nighty night!
Friday, April 16, 2010
been guilted into blogging...
so with all these people clamoring for my blog I decided it was finally time to unveil the happenings of my EASTer break. Haha, ok so people really aren't clamoring and there isn't really anything dramatic to "unveil" but I do want to procrastinate my paper another hour and figure this is a good way to do it :)
Once again I was my little nerdy self and brought along a notebook in which I jotted down notes of everything we did (well, close to everything). But here's the basic outline:
Thursday 4/1 Caitlin and I took a train from Strasbourg to Stuttgart, then a plane from Stuttgart to Budapest, where we arrived ~9:20 pm we staying in a hostel with Olivia for a night then switched hostels and met up with Erin and her friend Beria.
We were in Bupapest until Sunday (4/4) late night and then took a 11:15pm flight to Istanbul where Caitlin and I stayed with Erin. Olivia went home (to Madrid) on Sunday night from Budapest and Caitlin went to Madrid from Istanbul on Thursday morning. I stayed with Erin and then on Friday night (4/9) she and I took a night train to Thessaloniki, Greece for a few days. Erin went home (to Istanbul) on Sunday night and I flew to Stuttgart on Monday morning, and then took a train back to Strasbourg. Thus, now I am here :)
And so, without further ado, here commences my journey eastward.
Thursday (4/1) wasn't really an interesting day, just a day of traveling, but it was exciting nonetheless because we were finally going on our adventure East! I'm not sure why I'm so interested in Eastern Europe, maybe because it has a really different history and feel from Western Europe (although its becoming more and more Westernized as time goes by) and I love seeing different places than what I'm familiar with, but at any rate, awhile ago I decided I wanted to go East for Easter break (so it was my EASTer break- lol sorry that was bad I know), especially since I loved Prague, I figured I would enjoy other places in Eastern Europe also. Plus, its SO much cheaper there. I think my whole weekend in Budapest, souvenirs and hostels included, I spent less than $150. Alright shoot I'm off track. Ok so Thursday, Caitlin and I had a 1:45 train from Strasbourg to Stuttgart, Germany. So we got on, had a rather short ride there (only about 1:15 long) and then took the Stuttgart metro to the airport. European metro systems never fail to impress me. The US really needs to get on that. Well, maybe some cities have pretty good public transport, but the T in Boston is definitely lacking for the number of people that use it.
Jeez, I really can't focus this morning, I should probably go back and edit this post (but I probably won't lol). So we took the metro (illegally -- we didn't buy tickets - shhh!) and got to the airport. We both checked in and I checked a bag because I figured we were going to buy souvenirs and I wanted room to bring them back. Then we had a few hours to kill before our flight so we hung out, got dinner and a bretzel (german bretzels are SO good) and then finally got on our 7:50 plane. We took that for around 1:30 I think and landed in Budapest around 9:20. We got my bag and then went to search for the bus to the hostel. We also got money out of an ATM. I swear, monopoly money came out. I withdrew 10,000 forint (the equivalent of 50 USD) and it came out in one bill. One bill for 10,000 forint. seriously? haha Caitlin and I just looked at eachother and laughed. After that we went and waited for the bus. We took the bus to the metro stop and then found out the metro was closed - Welcome to Hungary! Ugh that was a hassle, especially since between the two of us, we spoke about zero hungarian. So we followed other confused looking people onto a different bus driven by a large, angry looking man who refused our money and took that bus to a different metro stop. Then we got to the metro and realized we had yet another problem: we had 2 10,000 forint bills and needed to get 200 forint coins to use the metro. So, obviously the easiest way to do that would be to buy something and I was hungry so we bought a snack. Then we realized the ticket machine was broken. Then a sketchy looking man sold us his ticket and showed us how to punch it (thank you, sketchy looking man for saving two confused American girls!) and finally, we got on the metro.
And then when we disembarked from the Metro, we were confronted with Budapest at night: changing street names, hidden doorways, lots of cars, multi-lane streets that we found ourselves running across (don't worry, we got pretty good at dodging traffic in France), but we eventually found our hostel where Olivia was waiting for us. We checked in, paid and settled in. Then we were hanging out with Olivia and another girl sleeping in our room who was from Lyon, studying in Paris, and spending a semester in Slovakia! She was really cool, we had a really funny conversation in Franglais with the three of us (me, Cait and Amanda- the French girl) switching back and forth into French and English. thennnn we all went to bed :)
Wow so maybe thursday was an interesting day. Haha well it was just the start to our adventures... more after I finish my paper ;)
Once again I was my little nerdy self and brought along a notebook in which I jotted down notes of everything we did (well, close to everything). But here's the basic outline:
Thursday 4/1 Caitlin and I took a train from Strasbourg to Stuttgart, then a plane from Stuttgart to Budapest, where we arrived ~9:20 pm we staying in a hostel with Olivia for a night then switched hostels and met up with Erin and her friend Beria.
We were in Bupapest until Sunday (4/4) late night and then took a 11:15pm flight to Istanbul where Caitlin and I stayed with Erin. Olivia went home (to Madrid) on Sunday night from Budapest and Caitlin went to Madrid from Istanbul on Thursday morning. I stayed with Erin and then on Friday night (4/9) she and I took a night train to Thessaloniki, Greece for a few days. Erin went home (to Istanbul) on Sunday night and I flew to Stuttgart on Monday morning, and then took a train back to Strasbourg. Thus, now I am here :)
And so, without further ado, here commences my journey eastward.
Thursday (4/1) wasn't really an interesting day, just a day of traveling, but it was exciting nonetheless because we were finally going on our adventure East! I'm not sure why I'm so interested in Eastern Europe, maybe because it has a really different history and feel from Western Europe (although its becoming more and more Westernized as time goes by) and I love seeing different places than what I'm familiar with, but at any rate, awhile ago I decided I wanted to go East for Easter break (so it was my EASTer break- lol sorry that was bad I know), especially since I loved Prague, I figured I would enjoy other places in Eastern Europe also. Plus, its SO much cheaper there. I think my whole weekend in Budapest, souvenirs and hostels included, I spent less than $150. Alright shoot I'm off track. Ok so Thursday, Caitlin and I had a 1:45 train from Strasbourg to Stuttgart, Germany. So we got on, had a rather short ride there (only about 1:15 long) and then took the Stuttgart metro to the airport. European metro systems never fail to impress me. The US really needs to get on that. Well, maybe some cities have pretty good public transport, but the T in Boston is definitely lacking for the number of people that use it.
Jeez, I really can't focus this morning, I should probably go back and edit this post (but I probably won't lol). So we took the metro (illegally -- we didn't buy tickets - shhh!) and got to the airport. We both checked in and I checked a bag because I figured we were going to buy souvenirs and I wanted room to bring them back. Then we had a few hours to kill before our flight so we hung out, got dinner and a bretzel (german bretzels are SO good) and then finally got on our 7:50 plane. We took that for around 1:30 I think and landed in Budapest around 9:20. We got my bag and then went to search for the bus to the hostel. We also got money out of an ATM. I swear, monopoly money came out. I withdrew 10,000 forint (the equivalent of 50 USD) and it came out in one bill. One bill for 10,000 forint. seriously? haha Caitlin and I just looked at eachother and laughed. After that we went and waited for the bus. We took the bus to the metro stop and then found out the metro was closed - Welcome to Hungary! Ugh that was a hassle, especially since between the two of us, we spoke about zero hungarian. So we followed other confused looking people onto a different bus driven by a large, angry looking man who refused our money and took that bus to a different metro stop. Then we got to the metro and realized we had yet another problem: we had 2 10,000 forint bills and needed to get 200 forint coins to use the metro. So, obviously the easiest way to do that would be to buy something and I was hungry so we bought a snack. Then we realized the ticket machine was broken. Then a sketchy looking man sold us his ticket and showed us how to punch it (thank you, sketchy looking man for saving two confused American girls!) and finally, we got on the metro.
And then when we disembarked from the Metro, we were confronted with Budapest at night: changing street names, hidden doorways, lots of cars, multi-lane streets that we found ourselves running across (don't worry, we got pretty good at dodging traffic in France), but we eventually found our hostel where Olivia was waiting for us. We checked in, paid and settled in. Then we were hanging out with Olivia and another girl sleeping in our room who was from Lyon, studying in Paris, and spending a semester in Slovakia! She was really cool, we had a really funny conversation in Franglais with the three of us (me, Cait and Amanda- the French girl) switching back and forth into French and English. thennnn we all went to bed :)
Wow so maybe thursday was an interesting day. Haha well it was just the start to our adventures... more after I finish my paper ;)
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
pics up!
pics up on both facebook (Budapest and Istanbul, Thess coming tom) and photobucket (Budapest, Istanbul and Thess coming tom)!
Monday, April 12, 2010
home... sort of :)
Back in France, loving that I understand (mostly) the language (after Hungarian, Turkish and Greek its so nice to get most of it). will update more and post pics sometime after I sleep, eat and shower.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Grand Adventure Update
Well, just wanted to let everyone know that I made it to Budapest safely, had a great time and am now chilling in Istanbul (!!!!) with Caitlin and Erin and Erin's friends. Obviously, much more will come when I get back to France and my own computer :)
love love~
love love~
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
allez allez Strohteam!
allez allez allez le bleu et blanc!
So, this past weekend was Criterium, aka Krit, in Strasbourg, and it was where all the IEP's (Institut d'Etudes Politiques) in France get together for a weekend of sports competitions, parties and general debauchery. The other IEPs are from places like Paris, Lyon, Lille, Rennes, Aix-en-Provence, Bordeaux, Toulouse, and a few other places I know I'm forgetting. Oh, Grenoble. So, yeah, all these schools get together and compete in sports like volleyball, handball, basketball, swimming, badmitton, soccer, you get the gist. I was supposed to swim, but I found out that I wasn't actually registered, so I didn't want to be stuck at the pool for 4 hours (you could only get to and from the pool by bus) if I wasn't sure I was going to swim. Quel dommage. So, instead, I watched volleyball. And I was told ahead of time that you really don't have to be very good to play, but I think I could've been an asset to the volleyball team lol. The men, on the other hand, were really good. Anyways, um, so it was really fun, it reminded me of the atmosphere at a rivalry football game, everyone repped their school's colors and painted their faces and bodies and just generally were crazy. Football games don't, however, last all weekend, so by sunday I was exhausted and couldn't make it out that night (I know, lllaaaammmeee haha) The only thing that was a little less fun than football games was that I didn't feel especially included. Because in France, the IEPs are pretty small schools, most have less than 1500 students total and they know basically everyone in their class. Whereas, coming from the US as a study abroad student, I know a few people and only for a few months. but it was still a fun atmosphere and fun to watch the sports and all that :)
Annnddddd tomorrow I leave for my Grand Adventure. Yes, that's the name I've chosen to give it. Caitlin and I are taking a train to Stuttgart, then flying to Budapest, where we're meeting Erin and her friend, Beria and my friend Olivia. We're staying there Thursday night till Sunday night. From there, Caitlin, Erin, Beria and I are flying to Istanbul to stay with Erin. Caitlin is leaving for Madrid on Thursday and then Erin and I are going to Thessaloniki Friday night until Monday morning. Can't wait! lots of updates and pictures coming in a few weeks!! :)
till then, Happy Easter! love you all :)
PS. Tomorrow is April. I'm not sure what happened to March and I'm not sure I'm ok with it disappearing on me like that... On the other hand, I seriously cannot wait for my adventure starting tomorrow! Guess I should get to packing...
So, this past weekend was Criterium, aka Krit, in Strasbourg, and it was where all the IEP's (Institut d'Etudes Politiques) in France get together for a weekend of sports competitions, parties and general debauchery. The other IEPs are from places like Paris, Lyon, Lille, Rennes, Aix-en-Provence, Bordeaux, Toulouse, and a few other places I know I'm forgetting. Oh, Grenoble. So, yeah, all these schools get together and compete in sports like volleyball, handball, basketball, swimming, badmitton, soccer, you get the gist. I was supposed to swim, but I found out that I wasn't actually registered, so I didn't want to be stuck at the pool for 4 hours (you could only get to and from the pool by bus) if I wasn't sure I was going to swim. Quel dommage. So, instead, I watched volleyball. And I was told ahead of time that you really don't have to be very good to play, but I think I could've been an asset to the volleyball team lol. The men, on the other hand, were really good. Anyways, um, so it was really fun, it reminded me of the atmosphere at a rivalry football game, everyone repped their school's colors and painted their faces and bodies and just generally were crazy. Football games don't, however, last all weekend, so by sunday I was exhausted and couldn't make it out that night (I know, lllaaaammmeee haha) The only thing that was a little less fun than football games was that I didn't feel especially included. Because in France, the IEPs are pretty small schools, most have less than 1500 students total and they know basically everyone in their class. Whereas, coming from the US as a study abroad student, I know a few people and only for a few months. but it was still a fun atmosphere and fun to watch the sports and all that :)
Annnddddd tomorrow I leave for my Grand Adventure. Yes, that's the name I've chosen to give it. Caitlin and I are taking a train to Stuttgart, then flying to Budapest, where we're meeting Erin and her friend, Beria and my friend Olivia. We're staying there Thursday night till Sunday night. From there, Caitlin, Erin, Beria and I are flying to Istanbul to stay with Erin. Caitlin is leaving for Madrid on Thursday and then Erin and I are going to Thessaloniki Friday night until Monday morning. Can't wait! lots of updates and pictures coming in a few weeks!! :)
till then, Happy Easter! love you all :)
PS. Tomorrow is April. I'm not sure what happened to March and I'm not sure I'm ok with it disappearing on me like that... On the other hand, I seriously cannot wait for my adventure starting tomorrow! Guess I should get to packing...
Friday, March 19, 2010
just a rando
3/19
Just felt like posting a random blog about nothing in particular... well maybe about something in particular - I'm randomly feeling homesick this morning. Not really sure why either. The most pathetic part? I am CRAVING a gym. Like, CRAVING. Anyone who knew me last semester would understand, I love working out. And biking to the pool, swimming for 45 min and biking back just isn't cutting it. I want to go to a gym where I can go on an elliptical machine and then lift weights. So I think Caitlin and I are going to check out some gyms in the area and see if there's any that fit in our budget (so, the cheapest ones.) And then if we find one, we're working out allll day tomorrow. I'm kind of excited for that actually.
3/24
Well I didn't post the above post just because I didn't think it was worth it - it was short and didn't really have any significance other than I miss American gyms. But, this morning, I found another thing I miss from the States: GRADE INFLATION. I got a few grades back and while none of them were terrible (although one was close), I was just surprised at the grading scale here. They grade on a number scale from 1-20 and BC has an grid where they equate certain numbers with certain letters. The thing is, though, that an A is 14-20, and a 14 is a GREAT grade. An F is a 0-6, so really the only grades fall into 7-14. For example, a 13 is an A-, a 12 is a B+, etc. But my thought is, if anything above 15 is basically impossible to get (it is basically impossible to get), then why do they have it? I know its just different, but comparing it to American numeric and letter grades, our system just makes more sense to me. It's not possible to get above a A+ and an A+ is usually around 100%. Its impossible (with the exception of extra credit or bonuses) to get above 100% so that correlates with the highest letter grade, A+. I guess I just question why one would have a system where nearly a quarter of the grades are basically impossible to attain.
Anyways, this weekend is Criterium, aka Krit, and its a big sports competition between all the Sciences Po schools in France. It's apparently a huge weekend long party and I'm really excited for it. Oh, and I'm swimming in it. HA. that'll be interesting lol considering I swim 6 or 7K on a good week now. But, oh well, it'll be fun :) so I'll probably post about that next week and then I'm off on my Grand Adventure! My spring break starts next Thursday and I'm going to Budapest, Istanbul and Thessaloniki. SO EXCITED. More updates will definitely follow that. And then after that I start gearing up for finals! Crazy! and then my family comes and then I go home! It's going so fast and I can't even believe that today is my halfway point! Especially since I know the next month is going to absolutely FLY by! anywho, I should get ready for class so I hope you enjoyed this random post (I figured I should post something since I haven't in awhile) and I hope all is well! Oh and for all the CO kids - enjoy the snow! I'm not jealous at all since its finally warm here (high 60s yesterday = glorious! I tanned on the porch! :) ) but I hope you got a snow day!
later y'all <3
Just felt like posting a random blog about nothing in particular... well maybe about something in particular - I'm randomly feeling homesick this morning. Not really sure why either. The most pathetic part? I am CRAVING a gym. Like, CRAVING. Anyone who knew me last semester would understand, I love working out. And biking to the pool, swimming for 45 min and biking back just isn't cutting it. I want to go to a gym where I can go on an elliptical machine and then lift weights. So I think Caitlin and I are going to check out some gyms in the area and see if there's any that fit in our budget (so, the cheapest ones.) And then if we find one, we're working out allll day tomorrow. I'm kind of excited for that actually.
3/24
Well I didn't post the above post just because I didn't think it was worth it - it was short and didn't really have any significance other than I miss American gyms. But, this morning, I found another thing I miss from the States: GRADE INFLATION. I got a few grades back and while none of them were terrible (although one was close), I was just surprised at the grading scale here. They grade on a number scale from 1-20 and BC has an grid where they equate certain numbers with certain letters. The thing is, though, that an A is 14-20, and a 14 is a GREAT grade. An F is a 0-6, so really the only grades fall into 7-14. For example, a 13 is an A-, a 12 is a B+, etc. But my thought is, if anything above 15 is basically impossible to get (it is basically impossible to get), then why do they have it? I know its just different, but comparing it to American numeric and letter grades, our system just makes more sense to me. It's not possible to get above a A+ and an A+ is usually around 100%. Its impossible (with the exception of extra credit or bonuses) to get above 100% so that correlates with the highest letter grade, A+. I guess I just question why one would have a system where nearly a quarter of the grades are basically impossible to attain.
Anyways, this weekend is Criterium, aka Krit, and its a big sports competition between all the Sciences Po schools in France. It's apparently a huge weekend long party and I'm really excited for it. Oh, and I'm swimming in it. HA. that'll be interesting lol considering I swim 6 or 7K on a good week now. But, oh well, it'll be fun :) so I'll probably post about that next week and then I'm off on my Grand Adventure! My spring break starts next Thursday and I'm going to Budapest, Istanbul and Thessaloniki. SO EXCITED. More updates will definitely follow that. And then after that I start gearing up for finals! Crazy! and then my family comes and then I go home! It's going so fast and I can't even believe that today is my halfway point! Especially since I know the next month is going to absolutely FLY by! anywho, I should get ready for class so I hope you enjoyed this random post (I figured I should post something since I haven't in awhile) and I hope all is well! Oh and for all the CO kids - enjoy the snow! I'm not jealous at all since its finally warm here (high 60s yesterday = glorious! I tanned on the porch! :) ) but I hope you got a snow day!
later y'all <3
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
things I love
1. Gossip Girl. for so many reasons, not the least of which is the attractiveness of the entire cast and the scandals they all incite.
2. rediscovering old music
3. discovering new music
4. cooking
5. my family
6. my friends
7. Crémant d'Alsace
8. Chocolate
9. you get the picture...
Ok, well I noticed today that "blogger.com" wasn't one of my most visited sites, which means that I haven't been blogging as much, which obviously is a wrong that must be righted. Thus, here I am, after my Acualités français exam, blogging because I my brain is dead.
The only really notable things that have happened lately were that I cooked dinner last thursday and this monday, I took a test and I've resolved to lose the 5 ish pounds I've gained so far before spring break (ha that's not gonna happen lol).
Anyways, so on Thursday, I made dinner and it was so good, if I I do say so myself. I made rice, chicken with bell peppers, onions and broccoli stir fry, salad with Angelo Pietro dressing and brownies. And oh man, it was so fun and cathartic being back in the kitchen. Its sad, but cooking became one of my study breaks last semester, since if I started thinking about school while cooking I'd probably burn something or chop off a digit or something equally bad. And so that's how it was here too, I put on some music and got to chopping! and I loved it... I'm such a nerd in so many ways lol but then on Monday, I decided that since Thursday went so well, I'd cook again and I'd try something a little more adventurous. oops, not the greatest idea... I tried cooking with wine since I had some left over but I think I did it wrong. The dish (chicken with peppers, onions and tomatoes, it was different from thursday tho, I swear lol) turned out alright, but I definitely thought it was going to have a lot more flavor than it did. It basically had no flavor. I think I need to reduce the wine separately and then pour it over the dish, instead of trying to make it a sauce... I'll try that sometime (probably not when I'm cooking for everyone tho). I won't be cooking again for awhile though, sadly, just because my schedule doesn't really allow for it until after break, at which time I could make dinner like every other night. Oh well, soon enough, I'll get to cook whenever I want and then following that, I'll have to cook if I want to eat lol.
So the second interesting thing was my actualités test. The class is about french current events and its really made me pay attention to the politics here - people are much more involved and informed than in the US (I'm pretty sure some people even follow American politics, and EVERYONE follows American presidential elections and politics, it's interesting). Anyways, for the class, we have weekly assignments in which we get 3 articles and we have to analyze and compare them by using journalistic clues like different signatures, title styles, paragraph lengths, etc. Plus, on top of that, we have to "evite tout les fautes evitables gramaticales" (= get rid of all the grammatical problems you can, aka. agreement, conjugation, idiomatic phrases, cliches, etc mistakes). If we don't get rid of all of them, we get counted down a lot because those are the mistakes that are easily avoided by looking in a dictionary. It's a good lesson in discipline, but it is kind of difficult, because you have to pay realllllyyy close attention to everything. So, we had to do that for our test - compare and analyze the 3 articles, but without computers (we could bring dictionaries though). I think I did alright. I really can't tell though because it depends on how he grades, but I feel like I wrote the best I could in the given time and with the conditions.
Oh and regarding the list above: I just haven't made a fun list in awhile, so I figured it was about time...
10. good food
11. good grades
12. smiling :)
13. that's all for now, I'll continue (i'm sure) later!
2. rediscovering old music
3. discovering new music
4. cooking
5. my family
6. my friends
7. Crémant d'Alsace
8. Chocolate
9. you get the picture...
Ok, well I noticed today that "blogger.com" wasn't one of my most visited sites, which means that I haven't been blogging as much, which obviously is a wrong that must be righted. Thus, here I am, after my Acualités français exam, blogging because I my brain is dead.
The only really notable things that have happened lately were that I cooked dinner last thursday and this monday, I took a test and I've resolved to lose the 5 ish pounds I've gained so far before spring break (ha that's not gonna happen lol).
Anyways, so on Thursday, I made dinner and it was so good, if I I do say so myself. I made rice, chicken with bell peppers, onions and broccoli stir fry, salad with Angelo Pietro dressing and brownies. And oh man, it was so fun and cathartic being back in the kitchen. Its sad, but cooking became one of my study breaks last semester, since if I started thinking about school while cooking I'd probably burn something or chop off a digit or something equally bad. And so that's how it was here too, I put on some music and got to chopping! and I loved it... I'm such a nerd in so many ways lol but then on Monday, I decided that since Thursday went so well, I'd cook again and I'd try something a little more adventurous. oops, not the greatest idea... I tried cooking with wine since I had some left over but I think I did it wrong. The dish (chicken with peppers, onions and tomatoes, it was different from thursday tho, I swear lol) turned out alright, but I definitely thought it was going to have a lot more flavor than it did. It basically had no flavor. I think I need to reduce the wine separately and then pour it over the dish, instead of trying to make it a sauce... I'll try that sometime (probably not when I'm cooking for everyone tho). I won't be cooking again for awhile though, sadly, just because my schedule doesn't really allow for it until after break, at which time I could make dinner like every other night. Oh well, soon enough, I'll get to cook whenever I want and then following that, I'll have to cook if I want to eat lol.
So the second interesting thing was my actualités test. The class is about french current events and its really made me pay attention to the politics here - people are much more involved and informed than in the US (I'm pretty sure some people even follow American politics, and EVERYONE follows American presidential elections and politics, it's interesting). Anyways, for the class, we have weekly assignments in which we get 3 articles and we have to analyze and compare them by using journalistic clues like different signatures, title styles, paragraph lengths, etc. Plus, on top of that, we have to "evite tout les fautes evitables gramaticales" (= get rid of all the grammatical problems you can, aka. agreement, conjugation, idiomatic phrases, cliches, etc mistakes). If we don't get rid of all of them, we get counted down a lot because those are the mistakes that are easily avoided by looking in a dictionary. It's a good lesson in discipline, but it is kind of difficult, because you have to pay realllllyyy close attention to everything. So, we had to do that for our test - compare and analyze the 3 articles, but without computers (we could bring dictionaries though). I think I did alright. I really can't tell though because it depends on how he grades, but I feel like I wrote the best I could in the given time and with the conditions.
Oh and regarding the list above: I just haven't made a fun list in awhile, so I figured it was about time...
10. good food
11. good grades
12. smiling :)
13. that's all for now, I'll continue (i'm sure) later!
Friday, March 12, 2010
Belgium: the land of chocolate, waffles and frites
Alright, I apologize for how long it's taken me to post about Belgium, but I am finally getting around to it, and I wrote about it in a notebook while I was on the train coming home so I wouldn't forget anything :)
Ok, so here it is:
Starting from Friday, we had an afternoon train to Brussels leaving from Strasbourg at 2:30 and we didn't get in until almost 8 - it was *long*. But we got there and had a half hour to kill before out next train to Bruges. So we went and got food - I found a banana nut muffin and was in heaven (I got a random craving on the train lol). Then we got on the train for Bruges and got there around 9:30. We got taxis to the hotel, checked in, got our keys and rooms and basically went to bed (we hung out a little before, but didn't go out, at least I didn't).
Saturday we got up and got breakfast and while it was nothing compared to Prague, it was good and we got fresh coffee. Then we had a guided bike tour of Bruges, which was really cool, but it was sooo cold! We were all frozen by the end. But, we did learn a lot about the city and its history:
- it has the first stock market ever which was founded around 1273ish I think
- The "Lake of Love" has a very Romeo and Juliet-esque story: a rich girl and a poor boy fell in love (why is it always rich girls and poor boys and never the opposite?) but her family got upset and so they got him sent to the war front thinking she'd forget about him. Obviously, she didn't, and so her family told her that the boy died in the war, thinking that would make her forget about him. Wrong again. She was so heartbroken, she drowned herself in the lake. Well, then the boy came back and found out that she had drowned herself, so, naturally, he drowned himself. See? the Bruges version of Romeo and Juliet.
- There are lots of old windows that aren't flush with the wall, they hang out over the river (easy to see, harder to describe), those are former toilets.
- The Belgians have over 300 different kinds of beer
- The term "daylight robbery" (the american equivalent is "highway robbery") comes from the taxes levied on windows - people with more windows paid more taxes. So, people used to brick up their windows to avoid the tax, and thats why they called it daylight robbery. There are also lots of bricked up windows in Bruges.
So, yeah, it was a really neat tour and our tour guide knew a lot of interesting history.
After that, we went back to the hotel to warm up (slash thaw out) and then went searching for lunch. We went to a sandwich shop with soups and salads and sandwiches and desserts called Humpty Dumpty. I got soup and a waffle :) The soup was really good - I really miss soup with vegetables in it, I feel like all I have here are cream soups (like cream of mushroom type soups) and it came with whole grain bread. I haven't seen whole grain bread in so long! It was like a dream come true. And then to top it all off, I got my waffle with chocolate sauce and a little bit of ice cream.. ah-maz-ing.
So after gobbling down all that goodness, we went to try to climb the Bell tower, but it costs 6euro and it was a long wait and we weren't into that, so we decided to just wander a bit. I got chocolate - a box for my host fam, a bag of fruits de mer (chocolate with praline on the inside in the shape of seashells) and a few random truffles (delish!) Literally, every other store was a chocolate shop, so I just chose one and it ended up being really cheap, at least, compared to other peoples' purchases. Anyways, from there Kelly and I went to the chocolate museum (lol I was a bit obsessed with chocolate), which was really cool and very well done - it chronicled the history of chocolate starting from the Aztecs and how it came to Europe and we got to about the 19th century when the last demonstration started, so we went down and got our free piece of chocolate :) We only had about an hour there and I wish we had had more time, but oh well, such is life. then we went back to chill at the hotel for a bit before dinner.
For dinner, we went to this cool restaurant, Restaurant le Passage, and had a nice dinner. I got the chicken stew, which was hunks of chicken (by hunks I mean I stumbled across a wing - skin and bones included) in a light cream sauce with potatoes and veggies and bread (more whole grain bread!) on the side. Then for dessert I got another waffle with ice cream and whipped cream and a dish of chocolate sauce on the side (I gave away most of the ice cream and whipped cream since I figured that'd be asking for trouble...) and it was SO good.
Then that night, we all went out together (all the BC kids) and it was really cool because our hotel was right in the middle of the nightlife area, there were tons of bars and clubs within 100 meters of our room, it was awesome. First of all, we went to Cathedraak, and I'm still not sure what kind of club it was... I think it might've been a gay club. Because we were literally the only girls and most of the people there looked to be in their 30s. So, we were a group of 12ish girls and 3 guys, all 20 or 21 in a club full of 30something men. Yeah, interesting... but it was fun, they played good music and we had fun dancing [only with each other]. After that, it kind of went downhill, we went to a few different bars but none of them were much fun, so Caitlin and I went home relatively early.
Then on Sunday, we got up and had to check out by 11, so I got up, showered, got bfast, changed and packed.
We checked out on time (barely) and Caitlin and I ended up just sitting in the sun until the cabs came to get us at 12 to take us to the train station
We went to the train station and took a 12:30 train to Brussels, where we met Susan and her daughter (Susan left early to figure out a problem with the tickets) who then took us around Brussels. We saw Grand Place and it was amazing - all four sides of the square were occupied by some architectural beauty: a cathedral, guild houses, a museum, etc. I can't even describe how overwhelming it was to see it. I took pictures, but those don't do it justice either. Oh well, after that, we saw the statue of the little boy peeing that's a symbol of Brussels for some reason. Then we got frites. Oh goodness, those were the best french fries I've ever had. They were so good and the sauce was amazing - it was called samurai sauce and it was some kind of spicy sauce with hot chilis. They were messy but so worth it. That was my lunch on Sunday - healthy I know lol. Then we went to a square where all the chocolatiers have stores (I didn't get any though, I still have chocolate leftover) and then from there we headed back to the train station, and a bunch of us got subway for the way home. I've missed American sandwiches with vegetables SO MUCH. In Europe, it seems like there's always one piece of lettuce and one piece of ham and one piece of cheese. I asked for extra veggies on my subway sandwich when the guy was making it because I've missed them so much.
In conclusion:
waffle: check!
chocolate: check!
frites: check!
Belgium: check!
It was a fun (if quick) weekend trip. I would like to go back sometime with Mom and Dad and go see the house where we used to live and where the cows scared me all the time, but I have a feeling that won't happen for a while. So, all in all, it was fun :)
Tomorrow I'm going to Nancy, a town about an hour from here, just for a quick day trip and I'm excited for that, it should be fun, and hopefully I'll post about that quicker than I posted about Belgium ;)
So, hope all is well with you! laterrr
Ok, so here it is:
Starting from Friday, we had an afternoon train to Brussels leaving from Strasbourg at 2:30 and we didn't get in until almost 8 - it was *long*. But we got there and had a half hour to kill before out next train to Bruges. So we went and got food - I found a banana nut muffin and was in heaven (I got a random craving on the train lol). Then we got on the train for Bruges and got there around 9:30. We got taxis to the hotel, checked in, got our keys and rooms and basically went to bed (we hung out a little before, but didn't go out, at least I didn't).
Saturday we got up and got breakfast and while it was nothing compared to Prague, it was good and we got fresh coffee. Then we had a guided bike tour of Bruges, which was really cool, but it was sooo cold! We were all frozen by the end. But, we did learn a lot about the city and its history:
- it has the first stock market ever which was founded around 1273ish I think
- The "Lake of Love" has a very Romeo and Juliet-esque story: a rich girl and a poor boy fell in love (why is it always rich girls and poor boys and never the opposite?) but her family got upset and so they got him sent to the war front thinking she'd forget about him. Obviously, she didn't, and so her family told her that the boy died in the war, thinking that would make her forget about him. Wrong again. She was so heartbroken, she drowned herself in the lake. Well, then the boy came back and found out that she had drowned herself, so, naturally, he drowned himself. See? the Bruges version of Romeo and Juliet.
- There are lots of old windows that aren't flush with the wall, they hang out over the river (easy to see, harder to describe), those are former toilets.
- The Belgians have over 300 different kinds of beer
- The term "daylight robbery" (the american equivalent is "highway robbery") comes from the taxes levied on windows - people with more windows paid more taxes. So, people used to brick up their windows to avoid the tax, and thats why they called it daylight robbery. There are also lots of bricked up windows in Bruges.
So, yeah, it was a really neat tour and our tour guide knew a lot of interesting history.
After that, we went back to the hotel to warm up (slash thaw out) and then went searching for lunch. We went to a sandwich shop with soups and salads and sandwiches and desserts called Humpty Dumpty. I got soup and a waffle :) The soup was really good - I really miss soup with vegetables in it, I feel like all I have here are cream soups (like cream of mushroom type soups) and it came with whole grain bread. I haven't seen whole grain bread in so long! It was like a dream come true. And then to top it all off, I got my waffle with chocolate sauce and a little bit of ice cream.. ah-maz-ing.
So after gobbling down all that goodness, we went to try to climb the Bell tower, but it costs 6euro and it was a long wait and we weren't into that, so we decided to just wander a bit. I got chocolate - a box for my host fam, a bag of fruits de mer (chocolate with praline on the inside in the shape of seashells) and a few random truffles (delish!) Literally, every other store was a chocolate shop, so I just chose one and it ended up being really cheap, at least, compared to other peoples' purchases. Anyways, from there Kelly and I went to the chocolate museum (lol I was a bit obsessed with chocolate), which was really cool and very well done - it chronicled the history of chocolate starting from the Aztecs and how it came to Europe and we got to about the 19th century when the last demonstration started, so we went down and got our free piece of chocolate :) We only had about an hour there and I wish we had had more time, but oh well, such is life. then we went back to chill at the hotel for a bit before dinner.
For dinner, we went to this cool restaurant, Restaurant le Passage, and had a nice dinner. I got the chicken stew, which was hunks of chicken (by hunks I mean I stumbled across a wing - skin and bones included) in a light cream sauce with potatoes and veggies and bread (more whole grain bread!) on the side. Then for dessert I got another waffle with ice cream and whipped cream and a dish of chocolate sauce on the side (I gave away most of the ice cream and whipped cream since I figured that'd be asking for trouble...) and it was SO good.
Then that night, we all went out together (all the BC kids) and it was really cool because our hotel was right in the middle of the nightlife area, there were tons of bars and clubs within 100 meters of our room, it was awesome. First of all, we went to Cathedraak, and I'm still not sure what kind of club it was... I think it might've been a gay club. Because we were literally the only girls and most of the people there looked to be in their 30s. So, we were a group of 12ish girls and 3 guys, all 20 or 21 in a club full of 30something men. Yeah, interesting... but it was fun, they played good music and we had fun dancing [only with each other]. After that, it kind of went downhill, we went to a few different bars but none of them were much fun, so Caitlin and I went home relatively early.
Then on Sunday, we got up and had to check out by 11, so I got up, showered, got bfast, changed and packed.
We checked out on time (barely) and Caitlin and I ended up just sitting in the sun until the cabs came to get us at 12 to take us to the train station
We went to the train station and took a 12:30 train to Brussels, where we met Susan and her daughter (Susan left early to figure out a problem with the tickets) who then took us around Brussels. We saw Grand Place and it was amazing - all four sides of the square were occupied by some architectural beauty: a cathedral, guild houses, a museum, etc. I can't even describe how overwhelming it was to see it. I took pictures, but those don't do it justice either. Oh well, after that, we saw the statue of the little boy peeing that's a symbol of Brussels for some reason. Then we got frites. Oh goodness, those were the best french fries I've ever had. They were so good and the sauce was amazing - it was called samurai sauce and it was some kind of spicy sauce with hot chilis. They were messy but so worth it. That was my lunch on Sunday - healthy I know lol. Then we went to a square where all the chocolatiers have stores (I didn't get any though, I still have chocolate leftover) and then from there we headed back to the train station, and a bunch of us got subway for the way home. I've missed American sandwiches with vegetables SO MUCH. In Europe, it seems like there's always one piece of lettuce and one piece of ham and one piece of cheese. I asked for extra veggies on my subway sandwich when the guy was making it because I've missed them so much.
In conclusion:
waffle: check!
chocolate: check!
frites: check!
Belgium: check!
It was a fun (if quick) weekend trip. I would like to go back sometime with Mom and Dad and go see the house where we used to live and where the cows scared me all the time, but I have a feeling that won't happen for a while. So, all in all, it was fun :)
Tomorrow I'm going to Nancy, a town about an hour from here, just for a quick day trip and I'm excited for that, it should be fun, and hopefully I'll post about that quicker than I posted about Belgium ;)
So, hope all is well with you! laterrr
Thursday, March 11, 2010
updates on my life
1. update from Belgium coming soon
2. I am obese from chocolate, waffles and frites
3. Reslife hates me (as I do it) and I'm back in Edmond's next year.
4. yay caitlin got housing
5. I REALLY hate BC Reslife.
that is all.
2. I am obese from chocolate, waffles and frites
3. Reslife hates me (as I do it) and I'm back in Edmond's next year.
4. yay caitlin got housing
5. I REALLY hate BC Reslife.
that is all.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
just a quick one
just a quick update today:
yesterday we had our wine tasting soirée, paid for by BC :) and it was awesome! we went into the cellars of the hospital, which is one of the biggest wine cellars in france, with the oldest wine in a barrel in the world (I think) - it was from 1472 and it smelled wonderful... but we couldn't drink any obviously. Instead we had other Alsacian wines: Crement, which was like champagne but better, less sweet I think, I dunno but it was good; Reisling, which was also good, spicy and sweet, fruity but also woody... it was complex lol; and we finished with Gewurstraminer (sp?), which was really sweet, it was a late harvest wine, which means that it was extra sweet. I really liked it, though, it was really good. However, after I got home, it was a little harder to concentrate on following conversations and making intelligent replies after 4 ish glasses of wine right in a row (he refilled my glass with Gewurtstraminer a second time). It was even harder trying to do my homework after those 4 glasses of wine lol, but oh well, it was an awesome experience, i didn't do it justice in this little blurb, but I wanted to make sure I wrote it down :)
Also, heading to Belgium (Brussels and Bruges) this weekend - expect pics and updates after!
Oh, and I finally got FB uploader to work, so pics are finally up :)
bisoux-
yesterday we had our wine tasting soirée, paid for by BC :) and it was awesome! we went into the cellars of the hospital, which is one of the biggest wine cellars in france, with the oldest wine in a barrel in the world (I think) - it was from 1472 and it smelled wonderful... but we couldn't drink any obviously. Instead we had other Alsacian wines: Crement, which was like champagne but better, less sweet I think, I dunno but it was good; Reisling, which was also good, spicy and sweet, fruity but also woody... it was complex lol; and we finished with Gewurstraminer (sp?), which was really sweet, it was a late harvest wine, which means that it was extra sweet. I really liked it, though, it was really good. However, after I got home, it was a little harder to concentrate on following conversations and making intelligent replies after 4 ish glasses of wine right in a row (he refilled my glass with Gewurtstraminer a second time). It was even harder trying to do my homework after those 4 glasses of wine lol, but oh well, it was an awesome experience, i didn't do it justice in this little blurb, but I wanted to make sure I wrote it down :)
Also, heading to Belgium (Brussels and Bruges) this weekend - expect pics and updates after!
Oh, and I finally got FB uploader to work, so pics are finally up :)
bisoux-
Monday, March 1, 2010
stories from a survivor of the BC excursion
haha you'll get the title towards the end.
Anyways, on Saturday, Susan planned an excursion for us with the Georgetown students and BCA (=Brethren Colleges Abroad, I think) students. Only Caitlin, Rebecca and Sam and I went out of the BC kids, but it was cool, definitely worth it, especially since everything was free.
We left from IEP at 9 and went on an hour ish bus ride to the Memorial of Alsace in Shirmeck, which was really cool and very well done. It chronicles the story of the Alsace region from the 1800s to now, and shows how the region changed hands from Germany to France multiple times. The most interesting section was definitely the WWII parts, which were really interesting and especially well done because that part was made to look like a battle scene, it was dark and there were [fake] trees and it sounded like you were being bombed. I'm butchering this exhibit, its really cool, a lot better than how I describe it. If you find yourself in Alsace with nothing to do for a day, go to Shirmeck lol.
From there we went and got lunch at this really good restaurant. We got a 3 course meal, complete with wine and coffee for free! We started with an entrée, which is like an appetizer plate, and it had grated carrots, beets, some other stuff and terriné, which is sort of similar to paté, I think. I didn't really like it, but oh well. The next course was a beef stew type dish and it was delicious, the beef was all tender and juicy and the sauce was delicious and it came with cabbage (bleh), mashed potatos (yay), a cooked pear (so good), and spaetzle! I love spaetzle, its a type of pasta that's made with egg, flour and water, basically. and its terrible for you because you usually fry it, but its really good. Then we finished with a dessert: some kind of cake with liquor and ice cream. I think it was a rum cake, but I couldn't tell what type of liquor it was. Whatever it was, it was amazing. That is one thing I'll miss about France - the food! haha then again, I do miss american food also... we'll see lol. oh yeah and then at the very end we got coffee or tea (I got café au lait, of course)
And then from there, we moved our massive girths (we all were stuffed) back to the bus to go on a hike. wellllll.... the road was closed. so we went on a scenic route to the same point, but from the back I think. We finally got to the convent where the hike started (Mt. Saint Odile) and looked around there for 30 minutes or so, took some pictures (it was on the side of the mountain overlooking cliffs) and then started our hike. The leader of our hike, Alex, was the leader of the BCA program. He knew the hike well, but we didn't. And he walked fast. The path was in the middle of the forest, covered with snow and ice and we were wearing regular walking shoes and regular clothes (I was in my pea coat, for example). So, obviously, many people fell behind. Well, that would've been fine if there was only one way in and out. Nope, lots of criss crossing paths going every which way. And did we have a map? of course not! That would be silly. Well, we luckily kept up with Alex, mostly by scrambling over rocks and jogging through ice and snow and hoping and praying we didn't fall or slip and break an ankle. Because if we did fall behind, we would've been on our own to find the way back to the bus. And a lot of people were behind and had to figured out their way back. Not to mention we started our hike at 4:30 and didn't finish until after 6, so the sun was starting to set and not everyone was back yet. Basically, it was a coordinator's nightmare, and the setting of a horror movie: dun duh duh dunnnnn: college students lost in the woods in a foreign country at night. And I could tell that's what Alex was thinking too, but he never stopped to wait for anyone, he just kept jogging along, at a quick pace and left people in the dust. Luckily, though, everyone made it back safe and sound and there weren't any broken ankles or really bad falls. They did straggle in for awhile, though, and if I were them, I would've been worried, because being lost in the woods at night is not my idea of fun. It actually could've been a disaster if someone had gotten hurt and couldn't get back to the bus or if someone had wandered off and gotten lost... thank goodness that didn't happen.
Then, with everyone safe on the bus and no one lost in the woods, we headed home. I was exhausted, but it was a fun day with adventures... pics coming soon :)
Anyways, on Saturday, Susan planned an excursion for us with the Georgetown students and BCA (=Brethren Colleges Abroad, I think) students. Only Caitlin, Rebecca and Sam and I went out of the BC kids, but it was cool, definitely worth it, especially since everything was free.
We left from IEP at 9 and went on an hour ish bus ride to the Memorial of Alsace in Shirmeck, which was really cool and very well done. It chronicles the story of the Alsace region from the 1800s to now, and shows how the region changed hands from Germany to France multiple times. The most interesting section was definitely the WWII parts, which were really interesting and especially well done because that part was made to look like a battle scene, it was dark and there were [fake] trees and it sounded like you were being bombed. I'm butchering this exhibit, its really cool, a lot better than how I describe it. If you find yourself in Alsace with nothing to do for a day, go to Shirmeck lol.
From there we went and got lunch at this really good restaurant. We got a 3 course meal, complete with wine and coffee for free! We started with an entrée, which is like an appetizer plate, and it had grated carrots, beets, some other stuff and terriné, which is sort of similar to paté, I think. I didn't really like it, but oh well. The next course was a beef stew type dish and it was delicious, the beef was all tender and juicy and the sauce was delicious and it came with cabbage (bleh), mashed potatos (yay), a cooked pear (so good), and spaetzle! I love spaetzle, its a type of pasta that's made with egg, flour and water, basically. and its terrible for you because you usually fry it, but its really good. Then we finished with a dessert: some kind of cake with liquor and ice cream. I think it was a rum cake, but I couldn't tell what type of liquor it was. Whatever it was, it was amazing. That is one thing I'll miss about France - the food! haha then again, I do miss american food also... we'll see lol. oh yeah and then at the very end we got coffee or tea (I got café au lait, of course)
And then from there, we moved our massive girths (we all were stuffed) back to the bus to go on a hike. wellllll.... the road was closed. so we went on a scenic route to the same point, but from the back I think. We finally got to the convent where the hike started (Mt. Saint Odile) and looked around there for 30 minutes or so, took some pictures (it was on the side of the mountain overlooking cliffs) and then started our hike. The leader of our hike, Alex, was the leader of the BCA program. He knew the hike well, but we didn't. And he walked fast. The path was in the middle of the forest, covered with snow and ice and we were wearing regular walking shoes and regular clothes (I was in my pea coat, for example). So, obviously, many people fell behind. Well, that would've been fine if there was only one way in and out. Nope, lots of criss crossing paths going every which way. And did we have a map? of course not! That would be silly. Well, we luckily kept up with Alex, mostly by scrambling over rocks and jogging through ice and snow and hoping and praying we didn't fall or slip and break an ankle. Because if we did fall behind, we would've been on our own to find the way back to the bus. And a lot of people were behind and had to figured out their way back. Not to mention we started our hike at 4:30 and didn't finish until after 6, so the sun was starting to set and not everyone was back yet. Basically, it was a coordinator's nightmare, and the setting of a horror movie: dun duh duh dunnnnn: college students lost in the woods in a foreign country at night. And I could tell that's what Alex was thinking too, but he never stopped to wait for anyone, he just kept jogging along, at a quick pace and left people in the dust. Luckily, though, everyone made it back safe and sound and there weren't any broken ankles or really bad falls. They did straggle in for awhile, though, and if I were them, I would've been worried, because being lost in the woods at night is not my idea of fun. It actually could've been a disaster if someone had gotten hurt and couldn't get back to the bus or if someone had wandered off and gotten lost... thank goodness that didn't happen.
Then, with everyone safe on the bus and no one lost in the woods, we headed home. I was exhausted, but it was a fun day with adventures... pics coming soon :)
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